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Beigadiee-Geneeal 



Thomas Feancis Meagher: 



HIS POLITICAL AND MILITARY CAREER; 



WITH SELECTIONS FKOM 



HIS SPEECHEKANp WRITINGS 



Capt. W. 




NEW 
D. & J. SADLIER & CO.jJl ^RCLAY STREET. 

BOSTON:— P. H. BRADYp0^9 T^.MONT STREET. 

A ONTREAL : — COK. NOTRE DAME and ST. FRANCIS XAVIER STS. 

1870. 



\o^ 







Entered according to Act of Conpress in the year 1870, by 
T). & J. SADLIER & CO., 
the Clerk's Office of tlie District Court of the United States for the Southern 
District of Kew Yorl£, 



Stereotyped by Littlk, Rennie & Co., 
046 & C47 Broadway, New York. 



DEDICA TION. 



IV yTEAGHER was a soldier before he girded on the 
sword. He was a soldier in the cause of liberty 
from the time when he stood upon the battlements of 
Antwerp, as he described in that famous speech, 
delivered in Dublin, July 28th, 1846, when he de- 
clined to stigmatize the sword, because ''at its blow 
a giant nation started, from the waters of the Atlantic, 
and by its redeeming magic, and in the quivering of 
its crimson light, the crippled Colony sprang into the 
attitude of a proud Republic — prosperous, limitless, 
and invincible ! " The fortunes and the honor of the 
brave men of his race who took up arms all the world 
over, "in any good cause at all," were always dear 
and near to his heart. 

In sympathy with this feeling, therefore, 1 dedicate 
this volume to 

W. F. LYONS. 

New York, December, 1869. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

Introduction 7 



CHAPTER I. 

His early Career — The Revolutionary Movement of '48. 9 

CHAPTER II. 

Meagher's Social and Personal Character — His Wit and 
. Courage 42 

CHAPTER III. 

Convict Life in Van Dieman's Land — Escape, and Ar- 
rival in America 64 

CHAPTER IV. 

Meagher as a Soldier — He raises and takes command 
of the Irish Brigade 73 

CHAPTER V. 
The Boston Speech at Music Hall 91 

CHAPTER VL 

The General at the head of his Brigade — x\ppointment 
by President Lincoln, and Confirmation by the Sen- 
ate—The First Battle 125 

CHAPTER VII. 

The Brigade goes into Action with eclat — Perils of the 
Rear-guard — Meagher in the thick of the Fight 158 



\i CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER YIII. 

PAGE 

The Battle of Chancellorsville— Decimation of the 
Brigade— IMeagher's Farewell 172 

CHAPTER IX. 

The Etowah Command — Defence of Chattanooga — 
Recognition of Meagher's Services 186 

CHAPTER X. 

His Career in Montana Territory — Meagher appointed 
Secretary and Acting Governor — He fights the 
Politicians — Raising the Militia — Journey to Fort 
Benton— His Death 192 

APPENDIX. 

Speech on the Transportation of Mitchel 213 

Speech on American Benevolence — Irish Gratitude. . . 225 
Speech at the Mitchel Banquet in the Broadway The- 
atre, New York, January, 1854 230 

Lectures in California 242 

John Philpot Curran 267 

Catholicism and Republicanism 273 

Extracts from Holidays in Costa Rica 284 

Meagher's Last Hours 351 




Why the life of Thomas Francis Meagher 
should be written requires no explanation. The 
career of a man who has made so interesting a 
part of the history of twenty remarkable years, 
who- participated prominently in two revolu- 
tionary struggles — a bloodless one in the Old 
World, and a sanguinary one in the New — whose 
eloquence has thrilled two peoples by a fervor 
not common to the orators of our time, but 
almost peculiar to himself, and by a redundan- 
cy of classic beauty, both in thought and lan- 
guage, which distinguished his oratorical efforts 
from those of any contemporary ; the career of 
such a man should not be left to the mere mem- 
oi^of his words and works. 

Th(Ji^8ands who watched his course, from his 
first entiysmto public life in the very flush and 
exuberance o^s^early manhood, down to the hour 
of his death ; — -^o saw with what self-sacrifice 



8 INTRODUCTION. 

he flung behind him the pleasures and honors of 
a wealthy home, to share in the labors and dan- 
gers of the patriots then battling for the cause 
of his countr}^; and who remember how man- 
fully he faced all the buffets of ill-fortune which 
followed — the disasters of defeat, the solemnity ' 
of condemnation to the scaffold, and the pen- 
alty of eternal exile : — all these thousands living 
in two hemispheres who loved him for the grand 
chivalry ^^'hich clothed him like the armor of a 
knight, and the tenderness which permeated 
every fibre of his genial nature, will, perchance, 
appreciate this volume, however imperfectly its 
pages may present the story of a remarkable, 
and not fruitless life. 

,How it comes to pass that the author has un- 
dertaken the task can be briefly stated. It is, 
with him, a work of love and duty. A tribute 
to a friendship cemented in years gone by, and 
enduring all days, even to the sorrowful end. 





BRIGADIER-GENERAL 

Thomas Francis Meagher. 



CHAPTER I. 

HIS EAELY CAREER — THE REVOLUTION-ARY MOVE- 
MENT OF '48. 

" It is held 
That valor is the chiefest virtue, and 
Most dignifies the haver. If it be, 
The man I speak of cannot in the world 
Be singly counterpoised." 

Shakespeare's Coriolanus. 

In writing of the life, character, and genius 
of Thomas Francis Meagher, we have to treat 
of one whose name is familiar in two hemi- 
spheres. It has made part of the history of 
Ireland and of America for the last twenty 
years. In Ireland it has been associated with 
events which characterized an epoch not rare 
in the story of that country, — an epoch of rev- 



10 THOMAS rHAKCIS MEAGHEE. 

olution. What Lord El ward Fitzgerald was 
to the period of '98, and Bobert Emmet was to 
the unfruitful though gallant movement of 1803, 
Meagher ^vas, in a great measure, to the revolu- 
tionary attempt of 1848. 

Endowed with the same gifts of youth, for- 
tune, and a highly cultivated mind, he was not 
deficient in the gaUantry to lead, and the forti- 
tude to suffer, which were conspicuous qualities 
in the character of Fitzgerald and Emmet. In 
America he has not only been recognized as a 
prominent representative of the genius, oratori- 
cal talent, and chivalry of his race, but he has 
contributed much, by th6 brilliancy and effi- 
ciency of his services as a soldier, to maintain 
the permanency of the Government. 

Born in the city of Waterford, Ireland, on the 
3d of August, 1823, he was placed, at the age of 

11 years, under the care of the Jesuits, in their 
famous college at Clongowes Wood, in the coun- 
t}^ of Kildare. Here his young mind received 
the first impressions of classic lore, and of the 
skill and power of oratory which afterwards 
made him so distinguished, and of which, even 
in those earh- days, he gave extraordinary evi- 
dence in his own school-orations. He left Clon- 
gowes College to complete his education at that 



IRELAND IN '48. 11 

of Stoneyliurst in Lancashire, England, from 
- which, after an assiduous course of study, he 
entered upon the world in 1843, with a reputa- 
tion for ripe scholarship and rare talents which 
his future career in public life has permanently 
established. The transition from the serenity 
of collegiate life to the busy scenes of political 
strife upon which the young student entered, 
upon his return to Ireland in 1843, was as sud- 
den as that which the mariner, basking in the 
luxurious calm of the Indian Ocean, experiences 
when the fearful simoom sweeps down from the 
coast, converting the placid sea into a boiling 
caldron. The Kepeal movement was then agi- 
tating the countr3\ Every town and village 
was in a ferment. O'Connell, playing with the 
passions of the people, which he controlled with 
a potency equal to the wand of Prospero, had 
constructed a gigantic organization upon the 
hopes he inspired, which promised to the aspi- 
rations of the most enthusiastic a national life, 
but which, after the incarceration of O'Connfell 
in 1844, was only redeemed from the obloquy of 
an ignominious collapse when the 3'outhful vigor 
of the country, which had been uncorrupted by 
the hackneyed ways of the politicians, stepped 
in, and declared that revolution, and not agita- 



12 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

tion, nationality and not "amelioration," was 
what the country needed. In the band of these 
true and earnest men who made this their Evan- 
gel, of whom John Mitchel, Thos. Davis, W. 
Smith O'Brien, Devin Reilly, Doheny, John 
Martin, McManus, O'Gorman, Dillon, were the 
leading spirits, Meagher stood in its front 
rank. What need to repeat the story of '48 ? I 
do not propose to do so here. The effort and 
the failure are but too sadly familiar. It had 
its heroes and its martyrs : the former could be 
numbered by thousands ; the latter, who fell 
directly under the bann of British " law" and 
obtained a place in history, may be but few ; 
but the exiles who staked and lost all, — whose 
chairs are vacant by the fireside at home, — 
whose family ties are dissevered, — and the sun 
of whose fortunes is overclouded, count by hun- 
dreds. Though their names may not be found 
in the honored roll of j^atriot martyrs, their sac- 
rifices are none the less. 

It was at this period that John Mitchel first 
made the acquaintance of the " Young Tribune," 
as people afterwards learned to call him. They 
met in Dublin, after Meagher's return from his 
English college, at the time when the marvel- 
lous effect of Thomas Davis' genius was awak- 



13 



ening the land to a consciousness of the innate 
power of the people, and recalling to mind the 
traditions, the valorous deeds, and the civiliza- 
tion of ancient Ireland, in trenchant prose and 
musical verse. When and where Meagher and 
Mitchel met, John Mitchel tells in the columns 
of his Irish Citizen, thus : — 

" It is difficult now, for those who did not 
know Davis, to understand and appreciate the 
influence which that most puissant and imperial 
character exerted upon the young Irishmen of 
his daj'. Meagher had never known him per- 
sonally, but had been inspired, possessed by 
him. In speaking of Davis, his Lancashire ac- 
cent seemed to subside ; and I could perceive, 
under the fa«titious intonations of Cockaigne, 
the genuine roll of the melodious Munster 
tongue. We became friends that evening. 

" Next day he came to me at the Nation office, 
in D'Olier street : we walked out together, to- 
wards my house in Upper Leeson street ; 
through College Green, Grafton street, Har- 
court street ; and out almost into the country, 
near Donnybrook. What talk! What elo- 
quence of talk was his ! how fresh, and clear, 
and strong ! What wealth of imagination, and 



14 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

princely generosity of feeling! To me it was 
the revelation of a new and great nature, and I 
revelled in it, plunged into it, as into a crystal 
lake. He talked no " politics," no patriotism ; 
indeed he seldom interlarded his discourse with 
those topics ; but had much to say concerning 
women and all that eternal trouble, also about 
Stoneyhurst and his college days. We arrived 
at my home, and he stayed to dinner. Before 
he left he was a favorite with all our household, 
and so remained until the last. 

" Soon after, bound by his allegiance to the 
memory of Davis, he fairly committed himself 
to the party nicknamed ' Young Ireland ;' and 
that cost him, what we all know. But, young 
Ireland, or old Ireland, he was always Irish, to 
the very marrow]" 

Meagher's services in the national cause of 
Ireland were compressed into the period of 
a few years. It was the stormiest time in the 
history of the country during all its struggles 
against foreign domination, since the days of 
the volunteers in 1782, when Grattan and Char- 
lemont were the master spirits, and the revolu- 
tion of 1798, of which Wolfe Tone, and Fitz- 
gerald, and Emmet, Bond, Hamilton Rowan, 



IRELAND IN '48. 15 

and the other leaders of the "United Irish- 
men" were the inspiration. 

From 1845 to 1848 Meagher labored zealous- 
ly in conjunction with the other leaders of the 
party upon which was at first somewhat sneer- 
ingly bestowed, but of which it may feel justly 
proud, the title of the " Young Ireland Party," — 
proud of its title because its young heart pre- 
sented itself as a barrier against the tide of po- 
litical corruption, place-hunting, and snivelling 
*' patriotism ;" and because it advocated the 
only thing known in Irish politics that rose 
above the genius of political tricksters — a na- 
tional sovereignty. Meagher's participation in 
this struggle is already well known. The en- 
thusiasm which his fervent eloquence and per- 
sonal daring created in the people, contributed 
perhaps more than any other agency to impart 
vitality to a cause which was only unsuccessful 
because it lacked the physical strength to com- 
pete with a power untrammelled by foreign wars 
or diplomatic combinations, which might have 
reduced its capacity to resist revolution within 
its own borders. In the Summer of 1848 
Meagher was captured, with arms in his hands, 
in the county of Tipperary, while engaged in an 
effort to array the peasantry against the au- 



16 THOMAS FEANCIS MEAGHER. 

thority of the British crown, after O'Brien's 
attempt at Ballingarry. He was tried for high 
treason, in conjunction with Smith O'Brien, 
Terence Bellew McManus, and Patrick O'Don- 
oghue, at a special commission in Clonmel. He 
was convicted, of course, and sentenced to be 
hanged, drawn, and quartered, and his remains 
to be placed at the disposal of her majesty the 
Queen, to be dealt with according to her royal 
pleasure. His speech on the passing of this 
barbarous sentence will long be remembered for 
its unflinching spirit, its calmness, dignity, and 
splendid justification of the acts for which he 
was condemned to suffer. It was as follows : — 

Speech in the Dock at Clonmel. 

" My Lords, it is my intention to say only a 
few words. I desire that the last act of a pro- 
ceeding which has occupied so much of the 
public time, shall be of short duration. Nor 
have I the indelicate wish to close the dreary 
ceremony of a State prosecution with a vain 
display of words. Did I fear that hereafter 
when I shall be no more, the country which I 
have tried to serve, would think ill of me, I 
might indeed avail myself of this solemn mo- 



IRELAND IN '48. 17 

ment to vindicate my sentiments and my con- 
duct. But I have no such fear. The country 
will judge of those sentiments and that conduct 
in a light far different from that in which the 
jury by which I have been convicted have 
viewed them ; and, by the country, the sentence 
which you, my Lords, are about to pronounce, 
will be remembered only as the severe and sol- 
emn attestation of my rectitude and truth. 

" Whatever be the language in which that 
sentence be spoken, I know my fate will meet 
with sympathy, and that my memory will be 
honored. In speaking thus, accuse me not, my 
Lords, of an indecorous presumption. To the 
efforts I have made, in a just and noble cause, I 
ascribe no vain importance, nor do I claim for 
those efforts any high reward. But it so hap- 
pens, and it will ever happen so, that they who 
have tried to serve their country, no matter 
how weak the efforts may have been, are sure 
to receive the thanks and blessings of its 
people. 

" With my country then I leave my memory — 
my sentiments — my acts — proudly feeling that 
they require no vindication from me this day. 
A jury of my countrymen, it is true, have found 
me guilty of the crime of which I stood in- 



18 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

dieted. For this I entertain not the slightest 
feeling of resentment towards them. Influ- 
enced, as they must have beeu, by tlie charge 
of the Lord Chief Justice, they could have 
found no other verdict. What of that charge ? 
Any strong observations on it, I feel sincerely, 
would ill befit the solemnity of the scene ; but, 
earnestly beseech of you, my Lord, you who 
preside on that bench, when the passions and 
the prejudices of this hour have all past away, 
to appeal to your conscience and ask of it, was 
your charge, as it ought to have been, impar- 
tial, and indifferent between the subject and the 
Cl-own ? 

" My Lords, you may deem this language 
unbecoming in me, and perhaps it might seal 
my fate. But I am here to speak the truth, 
whatever it may cost. I am here to regret 
nothing I have done, — to retract nothing I have 
ever said. I am here to crave with no lying 
lip, the life I consecrate to the liberty of my 
country. Far from it ; even here — here, where 
the thief, the libertine, the murderer, have left 
their foot-prints in the dust ; here on this spot, 
where the shadows of death surround me, and 
from which I see my early grave, in an un- 
anointed soil open to receive me — even hero, 



IRELAND IN '48. 19 

encircled by these terrors, the hope which has 
beckoned me to the perilous sea upon which I 
have been wrecked still consoles, animates, and 
enraptures me. No, I do not despair of my old 
country, her peace, her glory, her liberty ! For 
that country I can do no more than bid her 
hope. To lift this island up, — to make her a 
benefactor to humanity, instead of being the 
meanest beggar in the world, — to restore her to 
her native power and her ancient constitution — • 
this has been my ambition, and my ambition 
has been my crime. Judged by the law of 
England, I know this crime entails the penalty 
of death ; but the history of Ireland explains 
this crime, and justifies it. Judged by that his- 
tory I am no criminal, — you (addressing Mr. 
McManus) are no criminal, — you (addressing 
Mr. O'Donohue) are no criminal : I deserve 
no punishment, — we deserve no punishment. 
Judged by that history, the treason of which I 
stand convicted loses all its guilt ; is sanctified 
as a duty, will be ennobled as a sacrifice ! 

" With these sentiments, my Lords, I await 
the sentence of the Court. Having done what 
I felt to be my duty — having spoken what I felt 
to be truth, as I have done on every other oc- 
casion of my short career, I now bid farewell to 



20 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

the countrj of my birth, my passion, and my 
death, — the country whose misfortunes have in- 
voked my s^'mpathies — whose factions I have 
sought to still — whose intellect I have prompted 
to a lofty aim — whose freedom has been my 
fatal dream. I offer to that country, as a proof 
of the love I bear her, the sincerity with which 
I thought, and spoke, and struggled for free- 
dom, — the life of a young heart, and with that 
life all the hopes, the honor, the endearments of 
a happy and an honorable home. Pronounce 
then, my Lords, the sentence which the law di- 
rects — I am prepared to hear it. I trust I shall 
be prepared to meet its execution. I hope to 
be able, with a pure heart, and perfect compo- 
sure, to appear before a higher tribunal — a tri- 
buntil where a Judge of infinite goodness, as 
w^ell as of justice, wdll preside, and where, my 
Lords, many — many of the judgments of this 
world will be reversed." 

By special act of royal clemency, however, 
the prisoners were released from the extreme 
penalty, their punishment being commuted to 
transportation for life to the convict settlement 
at Van Dieman's Land. Li the spring of 1852, 
after nearly four years- of penal exile, he made 



HIS AERIYAL IN NEW YORK. 21 

liis escape, and landed in New York in the lat- 
ter part of May. He was welcomed with the 
utmost enthusiasm by all classes. The corpora- 
tion presented him with a congratulatory ad- 
dress, through a joint committee of both boards, 
at the Astor House, on the 10th of June, and 
tendered him, on behalf of the metropolis, a 
public reception. Meagher, on that occasion, 
made a most dignified and modest reply, de- 
clining to accept any public entertainment in 
his honor, but gratefully acknowledging the 
sympathies expressed for him and the cause he 
had espoused and for which he suffered. He 
said : " Whilst my country remains in sorrow 
and subjection, it would be indelicate of me to 
jDarticipate in the festivities you propose. When 
she lifts her head and nerves her arm for a 
bolder struggle — when she goes forth like Miri- 
am, with song and timbrel, to celebrate her 
victory — I too shall lift up my head, and join 
in the hymn of freedom. Till then, the retire- 
ment I seek will best accord with the love I 
bear her, and the sadness which her present 
fate inspires. Nor do I forget the companions 
of my exile. The freedom that has been re- 
stored to me is embittered by the recollection 
of their captivity. My heart is with them at 



22 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. j 

this hour, and shares the solitude in which they 
dwell. Whilst they are in prison a shadow rests 
upon my spirit, and the thoughts that otherwise 
might be free throb heavily within me. It is . 
jDainful for me to speak. I should feel happy j 
in being permitted to be silent. For these rea- \ 
sons you will not feel displeased with me for 
declining the honors 3'ou solicit me to accept." ' 

While the disappointment of the public was 
great, these noble words were received wit^i pro- - 
found admiration ; nor was there any hesitancy 
in accepting them as evidence of a true, a 
manly, and a magnanimous nature. 

Mieagher soon became distinguished as a 
popular lecturer. His first subject w^as " Aus- \ 
tralia," and was a brilliant effort of elocution. 
Other subjects followed, principally upon affairs 
relating to Ireland — her poets, orators, states- 
men, and men of letters — until Meagher became 
a favorite lecturer in every State and city in the 
Union, where his voice was soon familiar to the 
ear of his countrymen. As a public writer and 
speaker, also, his reputation became very great. 
In September, 1855, after studying with Judge 
Emmet, he was admitted to the New York 
bar, where he made at least one famous effort 
in the United States Court, in the case of Fa- 



VISITS CENTRAL AMERICA. 23 

bens and the other Nicaragua " filibusters." 
He soon conceived the idea of undertaking an 
expedition to Central America, for the purpose 
of exploring that wild and luxuriant country, 
much of the wealth of which was still unde- 
veloped, and through whose entangled forests 
new pathways had to be cut to facilitate the 
transit to the Pacific. Accordingly, accom- 
panied by Seiior Kamon Paez, son of the late 
venerable President of Venezuela, Meagher 
started for Costa Pica, and made a most valu- 
able tour through that country, encountering 
vast difficulties in traversing the hitherto un- 
trodden wilds, amidst which he discovered a 
new line of transit, which may be one day made 
available. On his return to this country, the 
information he had thus acquired w^as commu- 
nicated to the public in a series of lectures ad- 
mirably illustrated in panoramic form, and was 
subsequently published in a more permanent 
shape in Harper s 3Iagazine. Some of the 
passages in these papers exhibit his brilliant 
descriptive powers. 

In 1853, Meagher published, from the press of 
Redfield, New York, a volume of his speeches 
on " The Legislative Independence of Ireland." 
This collection, together with its introduction. 



24 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

furnished to the American public the salient 
points in his antecedent history, as well as the 
motives which impelled him to his patriotic 
career in his native country. The speeches 
were the reflex of Meagher's mind in its youth- 
ful vigor, and we know of nothing which he has 
since spoken or written that excels them in that 
ornate language so peculiar to him, or that fer- 
vor which the inspiration of '48 only could sup- 
ply. In the poesy of words with which his 
eloquence clothed every idea — the fine pictorial 
effect and rich coloring that adorned ever}^- 
thing he said, Meagher probably had no model. 
If he followed the style of Curran or Grattan — 
and he inclined most to the latter — he invested 
it with an originality of thought and expression 
that made his glorious eloquence all his own. 

In the " Preface" to this volume of speeches 
Meagher not only gives the reason for publish- 
ing them, but the motives which brought them 
into life. He says : 

" The anxiety will not be censured which in- 
duces me to save from injury the proofs of an 
interest early taken in the condition of my na- 
'tive land. Nor will it be wholly ascribed to 
vanity, if the hope escapes me that even yet 



PUBLICATION OF HIS SPEECHES. 25 

tliese words of mine may conduce to lier ad- 
vantage. To some extent the speeches may be 
considered out of date. The tone inspired by 
a people in the attitude of resistance sounds 
strangely upon the ear when the chorus which 
hailed the coming of the contest has ceased and 
the fire upon the altar has been extinguished. 

" To revive in Ireland the spirit which, in the 
summer of 1848, impetuously sought to clear a 
way, with an armed hand, to the destiny that 
lay beyond an intervening camp and throne, 
may be for the time forbidden. But in the 
pursuit of humbler blessings — in the endurance 
even of defeat, the vices which adversity en- 
genders or exasperates may be resisted — hope, 
activity, and courage be awakened — all those 
virtues be restored and nourished, which, in a 
loftier mood, were loved so dearly for the 
strength and ornament they bestowed. The 
suppressions of sectarian feuds— the blending 
of the various races that have at different sea- 
sons been cast upon our soil, and have taken 
root therein — the love of truth, liberality, and 
labor — the necessity of disinterestedness, in- 
tegrity, and fortitude amongst the people^the 
necessity of a high order of intellect, honor, 
and propriet}^ amongst our public men — these 



26 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

were the lessons taught, — these the vh'tues en- 
couraged and enforced — when, breaking through 
a corrupt system of pohties, the 3'oung Democ- 
racy of Irehind chximed for their country the 
rank and title which was hers hy natural law, 
by covenant, and prescription." 

In the mouth of April, 1856, Meagher made his 
first and only essay as a journalist. On the 9th ' | 
of that month he published the first number of 
the " Irish Neius,'" in New York. In this enter- 
prise he was assisted by two worthy gentlemen, 
Messrs. Richard J. Lalor and Gerald R. Lalor, 
who continued to publish the paper until its de- 
cline in July, 1860. For some time after the pa- 
per was started, John Savage was amongst its 
most active contributors. Meaoher himself 
wrote much for the journal in its enrlj days, fur- i 
nishing many humorous reminiscences of his ! 
Irish life, but not exhibiting in his other articles, I 
to any remarkable degree, that vigor of thought 
and richness of langflage with Avhich his lec- 
tures and speeches abounded. Journalism was, 
in fact, not Meagher's best field of action, and 
I think he had become convinced of that before 
he abandoned it for the stormy life of the soldier 
and the politician. 



lEISH FAMINE OF 1847. 27 

There were many incidents in Meagher's life 
in Ireland which seemed to iden'tify his future 
connection with the American Republic. One 
of them had a peculiar significance. During 
the height of the Irish famine of 1847, the ship 
"Yictor" from New York arrived in Dublin, 
loaded with corn for the starving Irish. The 
captain of the ship was entertained at a splen- 
did banquet in the Pillar-room of the Botundo, 
Dublin, over which the venerable Eichard 
O'Gorman, now deceased, presided. Meagher, in 
j^roposing the health of the ladies of America, 
concluded his beautiful speech with these 
words — " Should the time come when Ireland 
will have to make the choice, depend upon it, 
Sir, she will prefer to be grateful to the Samari- 
tan rather than be loyal to the Levite." These 
were prophetic words. The pledge they in- 
spired, Meagher kept to the death. On one oc- 
casion during the war he happened to meet the 
captain of the " Yictor." Meagher had then 
fought his brigade all through the Peninsular 
battles. Captain Clark was a lieutenant on one 
of the gunboats. Their meeting was of the 
heartiest kind. The captain recalled what 
Meagher had said in the Pillar-room, and, 
shaking him with both hands, exclaimed — 



28 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

*' General, you have nobly kept the promise you 
then made." 

During his visit to Central America, Meagher 
made many friends among the most distin- 
guished men of that country; and some of the 
most enthusiastic congratulations upon his gal- 
lant conduct in the war were afterwards be- 
stowed by these gentlemen. 

When the war in the South broke out, 
Meagher entered, as we have seen, promptly 
into the army of defence ; but he did not take 
this course with undue precipitancy, as from 
his ardent nature might be supposed. On the 
contrary, it was not until his conscientious 
judgment determined him that it was his duty, 
that he took up arms on the side of tlie Gov- 
ernment. But, his resolution once formed, he 
never for an instant wavered or grew cold. 
Both morally and physically his support of the 
Union was genuine and vigorous, such as any 
patriot or soldier might stake his reputation 
upon. When he returned after his resignation 
of the command of the brigade, and with it his 
commission, the enemies of the Administration 
counted surely on his siding with them, — partially 
at all events, for it was the general opinion that 
neither he nor his brigade had been justly treat- 



HIS BEAEIXG AS A SOLDIER. 29 

ecT. They were grievously aiad bitterly disap- 
pointed. At the dinner given him in the Astor 
House by a number of distinguished citizens, 
June 25th, 1863, on which occasion a magnifi- 
cent gold medal was presented to him, he fluug 
his private vexations, whatever the}" may have 
been, to the winds, and made one of his most 
impassioned and splendid appeals in favor of 
the National cause. It has been the positive 
characteristic of Meagher never to give up 
either a cause or a friend until he found the one 
to be false and the other to be bad. So true did 
Meagher prove himself to the National cause, 
both in and out of the field, from first to last, 
and all through the conflict, that President 
Johnson, in a communication addressed to the 
Adjutant-General, United States Army, setting 
forth Meagher's claims to promotion, urged 
them in the strongest language. 

Meagher's bearing as a soldier, from begin- 
ning to end, was the subject of uuiversal admi- 
ration, which was equally shared by the men he 
commanded, the generals associated with him, 
and even by the enem}^, from whom many ac- 
knowledgments of his courage and daring ema- 
nated on several occasions. His devotion to 
his men was unceasing. While observing all 



30 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

tlie rules of military discipline rigidly, as an 
efficient commander should do, he was always 
frank, joyous, and considerate with them ; care- 
ful of their wants when sick or wounded ; cheer- 
ing them by pleasant words and smiles on the 
dreary march, and inspiring them in the hour of 
battle by his example. It has been alleged 
against tile character of Meagher as a careful 
general, that he often exposed his brigade to 
unnecessary danger ; but it was never yet as- 
serted that during the whole period of his com- 
mand he ever took his men into a dangerous 
place without being the first to go himself. As 
Col. McGee said in his speech on the occasion, 
of the presentation of colors to the Sixty-Ninth 
Regiment at Carrigmore, the residence of the 
late Daniel Devlin, Manhattan ville, in Decem- 
ber, 1863 : — " The woi'ds of our general when 
danger had to be faced were not, ' Go, boys, go,' 
but ' Come, boys, follow me.' Yet, as we have 
stated, slanderous; insinuations w^ere bruited 
abroad, such as those of Mr. Eussell, of the Lon- 
don Times, and as substantially squelched, by 
the denial of those who had the best opportu- 
nity of knowing their utter falsity. However it 
may have been sought by jealousy or malice to 
fasten upon Meagher charges of recklessness in 



INJURIOUS STORIES REBUKED. 31 

time of danger and indifference to the safety 
and comfort of the men under his command, 
every such charge has been amply disproved 
and repudiated by those best qualified to bear 
testimony. When the general was appointed 
to a command in the West under Gen. Stead- 
man, the revered Principal of the St. Xavier's 
Jesuit College, Sixteenth-street, New York, in 
his letter of introduction to the Father Provin- 
cial at St. Louis, said of Meagher that " in all 
the battles to which Gen. Meagher led his sol- 
diers, he acted as a true Christian gentleman, 
with a truly Irish faith." On the eve of Gen. 
Meagher's departure for Montana to assume his 
position as Secretary of that Territory by ap- 
pointment of President Johnson, in the month 
of July, 1865, the author had the satisfaction 
of hearing another estimable clergyman say, in 
taking leave of the general- — "You may take 
this assurance with you, which I give from my 
own knowledge, that every soldier of the Irish 
Brigade speaks of you with the utmost affec- 
tion ; and that being so, you need not care who 
speaks otherwise." If further evidence were 
necessary to rebut the stories of the many gos- 
sips and unthinking people who weakly assailed 
a gallant soldier's reputation, it can be found in 



32 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

the address presented to Gen. Meagher at the 
headquarters of the Brigade by all its officers, 
upon the occasion of his taking leave of them. 
It was written by Col. James E. McGee, then 
commanding the Sixty-Ninth, and is as fol- 
lows : 

To Brigadier- General Thomas F. Meagher, 

Late commanding Irish Brigade. 

The undersigned officers of the original regi- 
ments of the Irish Brigade, in the field, having • 
learned with deep regret that you have been } 
compelled, by reasons of paramount importance, J 
to tender your resignation as General of the I 
Brigade, and the Government having accepted I 
your resignation, you are about to separate | 
yourself from us, desire in this manner, as the 
most emphatic and courteous, to express to you 
the sorrow we personally feel at your departure, 
and the sincere and heartfelt affection we en- 
tertain, and shall ever entertain, for you. under 
all circumstances and changes of time and 
place. I 

We regard 3^ou, General, as the originator of 
the Irish Brigade, in the service of the United 
States ; we knoAV that to your influence and 
energy the success which it earned during its 



THE IRISH BRIGADE. 33 

organization is mainly due ; we have seen 3^ou, 
since it first took the field — some eighteen 
months since — sharing its perils and hardships 
on the battle-field and in the bivouac ; always 
at your post, always inspiring your command 
with that courage and devotedness which has 
made the Brigade historical, and by word and 
example cheering us on when fatigue and dan- 
gers beset our path ; and we would be ungrate- 
ful indeed did we forget that whatever glory 
we have obtained in many a hard -fought field, 
and whatever honor we may have been privi- 
leged to slifid on the sacred land of our nativity, 
that to you,. General, is due, to a great extent, 
our success and our triumphs. 

In resigning the command of the remnant of 
the Brigade, and going back to private life, in 
obedience to the truest dictates of honor and 
conscience, rest assured. General, that you take 
with you the confidence and affection of every 
man in our regiments, as well as the esteem 
and love of the officers of your late command. 

With this sincere assurance, we are, General, 
your countrymen and companions in arms. 

P. Kelly, James Saunders, 

Col. 88th N. y. Irish Brigade. Capt. 69th N. Y. 

R. C. Bently, John Smith, 

Lieut.-Col. Com'dv 63d N. Y. Major S8th N. Y. 



34 



THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHEPw 



James E. McGee, 

Capt. Commanding 69th N. Y. 

Wm. J. Nagle, 

Capt. Commanding: 88th N. Y. 

KiCIIAKD MORONEY, 

Capt. (j»th N. Y. 

John H. Gleeson, 

Capt. &id N. Y., Company B. 

Maurice W. Wall, 

Capt. and A. A. A. G. Irit^h 
Brigade. 

Thomas Twoiiy, 

Capt. ti3d N. Y., Company I. 

Jdiix I. Blake, 

Company B, 8Sth N. Y. 

Robert H. jMilliken, 

Capt. 69th N. Y. 

. Garrett Nagle, 

Capt. G9th N. Y. 

JOFIN DWYER, 

Capt. 63d N. Y. 

Michael Gallagher, 

Capt. 88th N. Y. 

Laurence Reynolds, 

Snrgeon 63d N. Y. 

F. Reynolds, 

Surgeon y8th N. Y. 

Richard Powell, 

Asst. Surgeon 88th N. Y. 

James J. Purcell, 

A^st. Surgeon 63d N. Y. 

Chas. Smart, 

Asist. Surgeon 63d -N. Y. 

Richard P. ]Moore, 

Capt. 63d N. Y., Company A. 

John C. Foley, 

Adjt. 88th N. Y. 

John W. Byron, 

1st Lieut. 8sth N. Y., Comp. E. 

D. F. Sullivan, 

1st Lieut. audB.Q.M. 69th N.Y. 

James I. ]VrcCoRMiCK, 

Lieut. C^uartr. 63d N. Y. 



jMiles McDonald, 

1st Lieut, and Adjt. 63d N. Y. 

P. J. CONDOX, 

Capt. 63d N. Y., Company G. 

John H. Donovan, 

Capt. 69th N. Y. 

John J. Hurlpjy, 

1st Lieut. 63d N.Y., Company L 

Edw. B. Carroll, 

2d Lieut. 63d N.Y., Company B, 

Ja:mes Gallagher, 

2d Lieut. 63d N.Y., Company F. 

John Ryan, 

1st Lieut. 63d N. Y., Comp. G. 

Matthew Hart, 

2d Lieut. 63d N. Y., Comp. K. 

Bernard S. O'Neil, 

1st Lieut. 6'Jth N. Y. 

Matthew Murphy, 

1st Lieut. 69th N. Y. 

Luke Brenxan, 

2d Lieut. 69th N. Y. 

Robert Lapin, 

2d Lieut. 69th N. Y. 

W. L. D. O'Grady, 

2d Lieut. 88th N. Y. 

P. J. O'Connor, 

1st Lieut. 63d N. Y. 

Edward Lee, 

1st Lieut. 63d N. Y. 

Patrick Maher, 

1st Lieut. 63d N. Y. 

Daa^d Burk, 

, Lieut. 69th N. Y. 

Martin Scully, 

1st Lieut. 69th N. Y. 
Richard A. Ivelly, 

1st Lieut. 69th N. Y. 

Joseph >[. Burns, 

Lieut. -8-Sth N. Y. 

James E. Byrne, 

Lieut. 88lh N. Y. 






SPEECH IN IRVING HALL. 35 



John O'Netl, Do^hnick CoxVnolly, 

Lieut. 88tli N. Y. 2d Lieut. 63cl N. Y. 

Wm. McClelland, John J. Sellors, 

2cl Lieut. 88th N.Y., Comp. G. 2d Lieut. (53d N. Y. 

John Madigan, William Quirk, 

Lieut. 88tli N. Y. Capt. 63d N. Y. 

James I. Smith, Patrick Chamber, 

1st Lieut, and Adjt. 69th N. Y. 1st Lieut. 63d New York. 

Edmund B. Nag lb, Patrick CxVllaghan, 

Lieut. 88th N. Y., Company D. 1st Lieut. 69th N.Y., Comp. Q. 

Patrick Ryder, P. M, Haverty, 

Capt. 88th N. Y. Quarter-Master 88th N. Y. 



At the banquet given to the returned veterans 
of the Brigade in Irving Hall, January, 1864, 
Gen. Meagher boldly appealed to his comrades, 
demanding from them a denial of all these 
charges. He said, (we cj^uote from a daily pa- 
per) — " Comrades ! officers, and privates of the 
Irish Brigade, now that you are assembled to- 
gether publicly in this city, I call upon you to 
answer me plainlj^ unreservedly, and honestly, 
whether the charges which have been circulated 
concerning me are true or false. It has been 
said of me that I have on several occasions 
wantonly and recklessly exposed the lives of my 
men. Is this true or not ? [Cries of ' No, no,' 
in all parts of the house.] Have I ever brought 
you into the face of danger except when ordered 
there?. [Renewed cries of 'No.'] When I 
brouoht vou where dansfer was to be encouu- 



36 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

tered, was I not always the first in myself, and 
was I not always at your head ? [' Yes, yes,' 
and the most uproarious applause.] Having 
brought you in, was I not the last out ? ['Yes, 
yes, yes,' and a cry of ' first and last in the 
danger,' from one of the men.] I thank you for 
this contradiction of the malicious falsehoods 
which have been asserted against me, and I 
hope that this answer of the Irish Brigade will 
be sent not only over this land, but over to Eu- 
rope, where the enemies of this country have 
many sympathizers and abettors." 

That will suffice upon this subject. It is not 
an agreeable task to have even to appear to en- 
ter upon a defence of a brave soldier, whose 
laurels are the proudest as well as the strongest 
rebutting testimony to all charges or insinua- 
tions, but as matters of history I have chosen to 
put these facts upon the record. 

Meagher was the recipient during the war of 
many well-deserved honors from the citizens of 
New York. We have already seen that he was 
entertained at the Astor House b}^ a large num- 
ber of his friends and decorated with a magnifi- 
cent medal, a description of which will afford 
some idea of the taste of design and skill of 
execution displayed in its manufacture. It is 



MEDAL OF HONOR. ,37 

wrought in the finest gold and is about three 
inches in diameter, the centre being formed by 
a beautiful miniature of an ancient Irish Cross ; 
in fact it is a perfect fac -simile of the old Cross 
of Monasterboice, the tracery on the original 
being faithfully represented on the gold. Round 
the outside and bound with wreaths of Sham- 
rocks to the points of the Cross, is a scroll or 
ribbon of gold, edged with enamel, and bearing 
the motto of the general's family — " In j^ericulis 
audacia et Jirmifas in ccelo,'' (Boldness in dan- 
gers and trust in Heaven.) Behind this appear 
rays of glory emanating from the centre and 
typifying the " Sunburst." The medal is sus- 
pended from a military " ribbon" — red, white, 
and blue, edged with green — fastened by two 
pins: the upper one bearing the.w^ords, "Irish 
Brigade, U. S.;" the lower one is formed of a 
bundle of ancient Irish sJcenes and sparths, bound 
together by a wreath of laurel, which forms the 
loop in which the ring of the medal is inserted. 
On the ribbon are twelve clasps, each bearing 
the name of one of the battles at which the 
Irish Brigade was present, in the following or- 
der : — " Yorktown, Fair Oaks, Gaines' Mill, 
Peach Orchard, Savage's Station, White Oak 
Swamp, Glendale, Malvern Hill, Antietam, 



38 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

Frederioksbni-g, Scott's Mill«, Chaneellorsville." 
Oil the reverse of the medal is the inscription — 
" Gen. Meagher, from Citizens of New York, 
June, 1863." 

The officers of the Brigade also presented 
him Avith a splendid gold medal with the Irish 
harp resting on the American and Irish flags, 
surrounded with a w^reath of Shamrocks — as a 
token of their high appreciation and esteem. 
The presentation was made at the residence of 
Gen. Meagher, Fifth Avenue, by Col. Nugent, 
in the presence of a large body of the officers 
of the Brigade and a number of distinguished 
citizens. The hospitalities of the cit}^ were ten- 
dered to him bj" the Common Council, through 
a committee headed by Mayor Opdyke, at the 
Astor House ; and on that occasion the " Kear- 
nej^ Cross," upon which was the inscription — 
" To Gen. Meagher, of the Irish Brigade, Kear- 
ney's friend and comrade of the Old Division." 
The Cross was presented by Alderman Farley 
on behalf of the Corporation. 

When the Irish Bricjade was more than deci- 
mated, after the series of battles which pre- 
ceded that of Chancellorsville, Meagher re- 
signed his command ; tendering his services to 
the Government at the same time, in any other 



Meagher's son. 89 

capacity. He was soon after appointed to the 
command of the military district of Etowah, 
where he distinguished himself by the^ skill 
with which he held Chattanooga secure from 
the attacks of the enemy, with a small force, at 
one of the most critical points of Gen. Sher- 
man's grand movement towards the Atlantic, of 
which I shall speak hereafter. 

Thomas Meagher, the father of the subject of 
this memoir, was a wealthy retired merchant of 
Waterford, which city he represented for some 
time in the British Parliament. Here, too, 
Meagher's son, the issue of his Australian mat- 
rimonial alliance, was born, under the roof of 
his grandfather. Describing a visit to the quiet 
old home in the Urhs Intacta, in company with 
Meagher, during the '48 movement, John Mitch- 
el refers to the boy, in these delicious terms : — 

"In those same sombre rooms," says Mitchel, 
*' surrounded by the same solemn environment, 
there grows up at this moment another young 
shoot of that old Tipperary stock, a youth now 
of fifteen 3'ears, and with many subjects for 
thoughtful musing, if he has a head for thought, 
as is likeh'. Perhaps he occupies at this day 
his father's little study, surrounded by his fa- 



40 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

ther's books, and haunted by his father's fame. 
What reflections must have passed through that 
youthful head, as the news used to arrive from 
day to day of some desperate battle on the 
Bappahannock or Chickahominy — and of the 
Green Flag of the Irish Brigade fronting the 
red Confederate battle-flag (no unworthy 
match). Did the boy see in thought his fa- 
ther's dark plume careering through the battle, 
amidst the smoke and thunder, and the tempest 
of crashing musketry and fierce shouts of the 
onset? Did the young heart swell with pride, 
and hope, and a longing and craving to be riding 
that moment by his father's side ?" 

The loss of Meagher's mother, almost in his 
infancy, was supplied by the maternal care of a 
most pious and exemplary aunt, whose heart 
was interwoven with the life of the boy. From 
her care he passed to the charge of the Jesuit 
institutions, where his education was completed. 
His reverence for these institutions, and the 
system practised there, never faded. "Writing, 
years after he left them, he says : — 

" All over the world the colleges of the Jes- 
uits are precisely alike. I have spent six years 



FtEYEREXCE FOK THE JESUITS' COLLEGES. 41 

in Clongowes, their Irish college. I have spent 
four years in Ston3'liurst, their English college. 
I have visited their college in Brussels, their 
college in Namour ; their college in George- 
town, in the District of Columbia ; visited their 
college ill Springhill, a few miles from Mobile, 
in the State of Alabama ; visited their college 
in New Orleans, on the banks of the great Ee- 
publican river of the Mississippi ; and in each 
and all, whether as an inmate or a visitor, the 
prevailing identity in each and all, no matter 
what the clime, what the government — the pre- 
vailing identity has been to me not only very 
perceptible, but singularly striking. Not only 
singularly striking, but from the completeness 
of its identity, suggestive of a grand belief — 
the belief that there is, or can be, with all the 
strifes, vagaries, incongruities, or ennaities of 
the Avorld, a code of moral excellence, gentle- 
ness, and beauty which may reconcile and blend 
the diversities and antipathies which our com- 
mon nature, diseased by the fatal Fall, has 
thrown out and multiplied malignantly." 




CHAPTEK II. 

Meagher's social and personal character — 
his wit and courage. 

Meagher's nature overflowed with the spirit 
of wit and humor. His wit was exquisite at 
times, and his humor always irresistible, yet he 
loved more to listen to wit in others than to dis- il 
play it himself. The pleasant, hearty, and al- 
most silent laughter with which he enjoyed a 
happy joke, a quick repartee, or a brilliant 
thought thrown off spontaneously by his com- 
panions, will not be easily forgotten by those 
who shared with him the hours of sunshine 
which formed a part of his life in that interreg- 
num in New York which existed between the 
stormy passages of his political career in Ire- 
land, his penal exile in Australia, and his ad- 
vent upon a new battle-field as a soldier. Dur- 
ing that period it may be said that Meagher had 



HABITS OF INDUSTR 43 

no well-defined purpose in life, except the grand 
one which was. born with him, to be something 
great and useful in the world. While he en- 
joyed a comparative leisure in New York at this 
time, he was never idle. His lectures, his pub- 
lic speeches, his short journalistic labors, his 
Costa Rica pilgrimage, divided his thoughts 
with great schemes for the future ; — schemes 
concerning which he was always hopeful, but 
few of which, unbappil}', were destined to reach 
fruition. His law studies and his brief practice 
at the bar, were 3'okes which he bore, not with- 
out a little fretting to be sure, yet with infinite 
good-humor. He had the pluck to meet every 
difficulty in the path that lay towards the fulfil- 
ment of his aspirations. He was rarely down- 
cast ; for indeed such good fortune as falls^ to 
a man's lot from the love and approbation of 
his friends was always present with him. The 
creme de la creme of New York society enter- 
tained him and courted him. He lived in that 
atmosphere as well as in the affections of his 
own people. He may have been, in a measure, 
spoiled by it ; but I am not willing to give my 
testimony to that fact. Meagher was a gentle- 
man — an Irish gentleman — and no flattery 'could 
add to the consciousness which he alreadj^ pos- 



44 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

sessecl, that he represented, and was always 
ready to represent that dass the world over. 
There was that innate material in him that 
could neither absolutely bend to flattery, nor 
submit to the approaches of vulgar familiarity. 
Everything small and mean in official or in pri- 
vate life he detested ; and wdiile he accepted, he 
could smile at the ovations bestowed upon him. 
Hence he had some enemies. And why not ? 
What man wants to go to his grave without 
placing on record his enemies as well as his 
friends? If one's friends can be noted down 
amongst the good, and honest, and virtuous, 
and manly in society, it makes little difference 
where his enemies are placed. And this was 
precisely the case with Meagher. Here, there- 
fore, I leave this branch of the subject. 

There are many of his friends who remember 
with what indijBference he regarded such hostili- 
ty as came only from small and unworthy 
minds ; how little he was affected by criticisms 
that sprung from an ignoble source. Sensitive 
as he always was to everything touching in the 
most delicate fashion his honor and his name, 
he could treat with good-natured contempt, ex- 
pressed in an easy, and sometimes in a jovial 
way, attacks that even some of his friends re- 



HIS FEARLESSNESS. 45 

garded as severe and unjust ; dismissing them 
with a laughing but point-blank hit at the petty 
slanderer. But with what trenchant force he 
could defend himself when assailed from quar- 
ters worthy of his ire ! How boldly he could 
meet an attack, whether it came from a mob or 
a newspaper ! Mark his bearing in the turbu- 
lent scene at Belfast, when, in company with 
Mitchel and Smith O'Brien, he confronted the 
burly butchers of Hercules-street. As joyous 
as he was fearless in his bravery, he saw all the 
fun of the thing, while he did not think much 
about the danger. In Limerick, too, at the fa- 
mous banquet given to O'Brien, Mitchel, and 
himself, on the 29th of April, 1848, when a 
Senseless mob, instigated by an influence — 
which was powerful in proportion as it was re- 
garded as sacred, and coming from a reverend 
source — made an assault upon the building, 
smashed the windows with stones, set fire to the 
structure, without one chivalrous thought for 
the safety of the hundreds of ladies who were 
within. Here, in the midst of the tumult, 
Meagher's calmness did not forsake him. While 
O'Brien, with his usual impetuous courage, went 
out of doors into the midst of the surging and 
howling mass, by whom — it is shameful to re- 



46 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

cord — lie was grossly maltreated, liopiiioto cow 
them by his boldness, Mitchel ami Meagher re- 
mained within, awaiting the opportunity to say 
what they had to say, and were not going to 
leave without saying it. O'Brien, Mitchel, and 
Meagher had just been arrested on a charge of 
sedition, and were then under bail to appear 
before the Court of Queen's Bench at the ap- 
proaching term. When the tumult was stilled, 
Meagher uttered this magnificent vindication of 
sedition, than which few nobler words ever came 
from his impassioned lips : — 

" The occurrences of this evening do not dis- 
hearten me. I am encouraged by your sympa- 
th}', and can, therefore, forgive the rudeness of 
the rabble. 

" Nor do I conceive that our cause is injured 
by these manifestations of ignorance and im- 
morality. The mists from the marshes obscure 
the sun — they do not taint, they do not extin- 
guish it. 

" Enough of this. The wrongs and perils of 
the country must exclude from our minds every 
other subject of consideration. 

" From the summer of 1846 to the winter of 
1848, the wing of an avenging angel swept our 



SPEECH AT LIMERICK. 47 

soil and sky. The fruits of the earth died as 
the shadow passed, and they who liad nursed 
them into life, read in the withered leaves that 
they, too, should die ; and, dying, swell the red 
catalogue of carnage in which the sins and 
splendors of that empire — of which we are the 
prosecuted foes. — have been immortalized. And, 
whilst. death thus counted in his spoils by the 
score, we, who should have stood up between 
the destroyer and the doomed — we, who should 
have prayed together, marched together, fought 
together, to save the people — we were in arms — 
drilled and disciplined into factions — striking 
each other across the graves that each day 
opened at our feet, instead of joining hands 
above them, and snatching victory from death. 

"The cry of famine was lost in the cry of 
faction, and many a brave heart, flying from the 
scene, bled as it looked back upon the riotous 
profanation in which the worst passions of the 
country were engaged. 

" You know the rest — you know the occur- 
rences of the last few weeks. At the very hour 
when the feud was hottest, a voice from the 
banks of the Seine summoned us to desist. 
That voice has been obeyed — we have trampled 
upon the whims and prejudices that divided 



48 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

US — and it is this event that explains the sedi- 
tion in which we gloiy. The sudden reconstruc- 
tion of the regenerative power w4iich, in 1843, 
menaced the integrity of the empire, and prom- 
ised hbertj to this island, dictated the language 
which has entitled us to the vengeance of the 
minister and the confidence of the people. 

" Nor this alone. It is not in the language of 
the lawyer or the police magistrate that the 
wrongs and aspirations of an oppressed nation 
should be stated. For the pang with which it 
writhes — for the passion with which it heaves — 
for the chafed heart — the burning brain — the 
quickening pulse — the soaring soul — there is a 
language quite at variance with the grammar 
and the syntax of a government. It is gener- 
ous, bold, and passionate. It often glows with 
the fire of genius — it sometimes thunders with 
the spirit of the prophet. It is tainted with no 
falsehood — it is polished with no flattery. In 
the desert — on the mountain — within the city — 
everywhere — it has been spoken, throughout 
all ages. It requires no teaching — it is the in- 
herent and imperishable language of humanity. 
Kings, soldiers, judges, hangmen, have pro- 
claimed it. In pools of blood they have sought 
to cool and quench this fiery tongue. They 



SPEECH AT LIMERICK. 49 

have built the prison-thej have Launched the 
convict-ship-they have planted the gallows 
tree-to warn it to be still. The sword", the 
sceptre, the black mask, the guillotine-all have 
failed. Sedition wears the crown in Europe on 
this day, and the scaffold, on which the poor 
scribes of royalty had scrawled her death-sen- 
tence, is the throne upon which she receives the 
homage of humanity, and guarantees its glory. 
" Therefore it is, I do not blush for the crime 
with which I have been charged. Therefore it 
IS, you have invited a traitorous triumvirate to 
your ancient and gallant city, and have honored 
them this evening. 

o 

" In doing so, you have taken your stand 
agamst the government of England, and I know 
of no spot in Ireland where a braver stand 
should be made than here, by the waters of the 
Shannon, where the sword of Sarsfield flashed. 
Whilst that old Treaty stone, without the Tho- 
mond gate, attests the courage and the honor of 
your fathers, the nerve and faith of Limerick 
shall never be mistrusted. 

"No, there could be no coward born within 
those walls, which, in their old age, instruct so 
thrillingly the young hearts that gaze upon 
them with reverence^whispering to them, as 



50 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

they do, memories that drive the blood, in boil- 
ing currents, through the veins — telling those 
young hearts, not to doubt, not to falter, not to 
fear — that in a sunnier hour the Wild Geese 
shall yet return from France ! 

" These sentiments are, no doubt, seditious, 
and the expression of them may bring me with- 
in the provisions of this new felony bill — the 
bill, mind you, that is to strike the nation dumb. 

" Yes, from this day out, you must, lie down, 
and eat your words ! Yes, you — you starved 
wretch, lying naked in that ditch, with clenched 
teeth and starting eye, gazing on the clouds 
that redden with the flames in which your hovel 
is consumed — what matters it that the claw of 
hunger is fastening in j^our heart — what matters 
it that the hot poison of the fever is shooting 
through your brain — what matters it that the 
tooth of the lean dog is cutting through the 
bone of that dead child, of which you were once 
the guardian — what matters it that the lips of 
that spectre there, once the pride and beauty of 
the village, when you wooed and won her as 
your bride, are blackened with the blood of the 
youngest to whom she has given birth — what 
matters it that the golden grain, which sprung 
from the sweat you squandered on the soil, has 



SPEECH AT LIMERICK. 51 

been torn from your grasp, and Heaven's first 
decree to fallen man be contravened by human 
law — what matters it that you are thus pained 
and stung — thus lashed and maddened — hush ! 
— beat back the passion that rushes from your 
heart — check the curse that gurgles in your 
throat — die ! — die without a groan ! — die with- 
out a struggle! — die without a cry! — for the 
government which starves you, desires to live 
in peace ! 

"Shall this be so? 

" Shall the conquest of Ireland be this year 
completed? Shall the spirit which has survived 
the pains and penalties of centuries — which has 
never ceased to stir the heart of Ireland with 
the hope of a better day — which has defied the 
sword of famine and the sword of law — which 
has lived through the desolation of the last 
year, and kept the old flag flying, spite of the 
storm which rent its folds — w4iat ! shall this 
spirit sink down at last — tamed and crippled by 
the blow with which it has been struck — mut- 
tering no sentiment that is not loyal, legal, 
slavish, and corrupt ? 

" Why should I put this question ? 

/' Have I not been already answered by that 
flash of arms, which purifies the air where the 



52 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

pestilence has been ? Have I not already 
caught the quick beating of that heart, which 
many men had said Avas cold and dull, and, in 
its strong pulsation, have we not heard the rush- 
ing of that current, which, for a time, may over- 
flow the land — overflow it, to fertilize, to restore, 
and beautify ? 

" The mind of Ireland no longer wavers. It 
has acquired the faith, the constancy, the hero- 
ism of a predestined martyr. It foresees the 
Avorst — prepares for the worst. The cross — as 
in Milan — glitters in the haze of battle, and 
points to eternity ! 

" We shall no longer seek for liberty in the 
bye-ways. On the broad field, in front of the 
foreign swords, the soul of this nation, grown 
young and chivalrous again, shall clothe herself, 
like the Angel of the Resurrection, in the white 
robe, and point to the sepulchre that is void ; 
or shall mount the scaffold — that eminence on 
which man}^ a radiant transfiguration has taken 
place — and bequeath to the crowd below, a les- 
son for their instruction, and an idol for their 
w^orship !" 

Of a similar character as the scene of the 
Limerick Banquet, though not as violent or as 



SCENE IN THE CORK THEATRE. 53 

savage, was that which occurred in the Cork 
theatre on the night of the 20th of September, 
1847. The galleries were taken possession of 
by a crowd, representing the " Old Ireland" 
party, whose Shibboleth just then was — " Who 
killed O'Connell ?" This crowd made but a trifle 
of breaking down the doors when opposition to 
their entrance was presented. They formed a 
solid phalanx in the gallery, and seemed deter- 
mined that no speaker on that stage should be 
heard. With considerable difficulty O'Brien, 
Meagher, and their friends obtained entrance 
through the stage door, so dense was the brawl- 
ing mass outside. Denny Lane vainly at- 
tempted to obtain a hearing for the speakers. 
Michael Joseph Barry, who was then popular 
with his townsmen, was equally unsuccessful. 
O'Brien made a stubborn effort to get a hear- 
ing, in which he only partially succeeded, and 
finally retired from the scene. He made his 
speech, but it was imperfectly heard. When 
Meagher advanced to the front of the stage, he 
was received with a storm of yells from the 
upper regions, mingled with cheers from the 
pit and boxes, to which the ladies heartily 
added their approbation of the young orator. 
For five- minutes he looked silently on the tu- 



54 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

mult. Then, striking his clenched hand upon 
the railing which was temporarily constructed 
to prevent a rush of the crowd upon the stage, 
he cried out — " If I have to stand here until 
to-morrow, you must hear what I have got to 
say." The sound of his voice stayed the out- 
cries, and he proceeded to deliver an oration, 
the peroration of which is perhaps one of the^ 
most finished efforts, as w^ell as the strongest 
illustration of his power over the masses. The 
writer remembers well the effect of that burst 
of eloquence, for he stood by the orator's side. 
It fell amongst those stormy elements like the 
voice upon the waters, bidding them to be still. 
, Italy was at that time in the throes of an insur- 
rection. Pius the Ninth, then in the first year 
of his pontificate, was planning measures of 
political amnesty and amelioration. Meagher 
seized upon the news to give effect to his 
speech, winch he did in the following splendid 
language : 

"Ah! is there nothing, at this day, at this 
very hour, to stir the blood within you ? Do 
jou not hear it? Does it not ring through the 
soul, and quiver through the brain? Beyond 



IN THE COKK THEATRE. 5S 

the Alps a trumpet calls the dead nations of 
Europe from their shrouds ! 

" Italj ! at whose tombs the poets of the 
Christian world have knelt and received their 
inspiration — Ital}' ! amid the ruins of whose 
forum the orators of the world have learned to 
sway the souls of men, and guide them, like the 
coursers of the sun, through all climes and sea- 
sons, changing darkness into light, and giving 
heat to the coldest clay — Italy ! from whose ra- 
diant skies the sculptor draws down the fire that 
quickens the marble into life, and bids it take 
those wondrous forms, which shall perish only 
when the stars change into drops of blood, and 
fall to earth — Italy ! where religion, claiming the 
noblest genius as her handmaid, has reared the 
loftiest temples to the Divinity, and Avith a 
pomp, which in the palaces of the Caesars never 
shone, attracts the proudest children of the 
earth to the ceremonies of her immortal faith — 
Italy ! the beautiful, the brilliant, and the gift- 
ed — ^Italy ! Italy is in arms ! 

" Dow^n for centuries, amid the dust of heroes 
wasting silently away, she has started from her 
swoon, for the vestal fire could not be extin- 
guished. Austria — old, decrepit, haggard thief 



56 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER.- 

— clotted with the costly blood of Poland — 
trembles as she sheathes her sword, and plays 
the penitent within Ferrara's walls. 

" Glory ! Glory ! to the citizens of Rome, pa- 
tricians and plebeians, who think that liberty is 
worth a drop of blood, and will not stint the 
treasure to befriend in other lands a sluggish, 
false morality ! 

" Glory ! Glory ! to the maids and matrons of 
Rome — descendants of Cornelia — inheritors of 
the pride and loveliness of Nina di Rasseli — 
who, working scarfs of gold and j^urple for the 
keenest marksmen, bid the chivalry of their 
houses go forth and bring the vulture, shadow- 
ing their sunny skies, reeking to the earth ! 

" Glory ! Glory ! to the High Priest, who, 
within the circle of the Seven Hills — whose 
summits glitter with ten thousand virgin bayo- 
nets — plants the banner of the Cross, and, in 
that sign, commands the civic guard to strike 
and conquer ! 

" And what can Ireland do, to aid this bril- 
liant nation in her struggle ? In rags, in hun- 
ger, and in sickness — sitting, like a widowed 
queen, amid the shadows of her pillar towers 
and the gray altars of a forgotten creed — with 
two millions of her sons and daughters lying 



IN THE CORK THEATRE. 57 

slain and shroudless at her feet — what can this 
poor island do ? 

" Weak, sorrowful, treasureless as she is, 1 be- 
lieve there are still a few rich drops within her 
heart that she can spare. 

" Perish the law that forbids her to give 
more ! Perish the law that, having drained her 
of her wealth, forbids her to be the boldest 
spirit in the fight ! Perish the law which, in 
the language of our young apostle — * our proph- 
et and our guide' — compels her sons to perish 
in a climate soft as a mother's smile — fruitful 
as God's love ! Perish the law which, in the 
language of one whose genius I admire, but 
whose apostasy I shall never imitate, ' converts 
the island, which ought to be the most fortunate 
in the world, into a receptacle of suffering and 
degradation — counteracting the magnificent ar- 
rangement of Providence — frustrating the be- 
neficent designs of God.' " 

During the interval between his arrival in 
New York aiid the breaking out of the war, 
Meagher's mind was unembarrassed by the 
graver thoughts which preceded and followed 
these two epochs, and it was then that his fine 
social qualities were best displayed. While 



58 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

reading law, and skimming over novels in 
Judge Emmett's office ; — while practising his 
legal profession, with Malcolm Campbell, under 
the title of Meagher and Campbell, in the third 
story natty office in Ann-street, with Bartholo- 
mew O'Connor, ex-judge and good fellow, for a 
joint tenant ; — while laboring, or gossipping in 
the editorial sanctum of the Irish Netvs, in the 
dingy little double room, partitioned off, and 
well pasted over with maps and Irish illustra- 
tions, up a crooked stairs, he found time for an 
occasional hour of social enjoyment, at which 
times hife heart would open to his friends, and 
all the genial humor of his nature would pour 
forth in a bubbling flood. Public entertain- 
ments, too, engrossed a portion of his leisure, 
for his splendid eloquence was welcome every- 
where. He was the guest of every organized 
society in the city ; but the "Friendly Sons of 
St. Patrick" claimed him annually, first as a 
guest, and afterwards as a member, until, in 
1856, he could no longer wash down their Brit- 
ish loyalty, even with the very best champagne, 
and, as about this time that sentiment Avas be- 
coming paramount to all national Irish feeling, 
Meagher left the body, so far as to withdraw 
his presence from its banquets in future. 



IN CLONMEL JAIL. 59 

I have alluded to Meagher's mfinite fund of 
humor and light-heartedness. The}^ never left 
him in all the trying circumstances of his life ; — 
not even under the most trying of all, when he 
had listened to the sentence to be hanged, 
drawn, and quartered ! 

A writer in the " Duhlin Nation,'' describing 
Meagher in his cell in Clonmel jail, while under 
sentence of death, says, " His wit, his genial 
fun, his talents and accomplishments, even his 
high health and spirits, were the inspirations 
of his companions. 

" There was no feverish glare in his gayety, — 
no strained effort. It was of that natural, 
healthful sort, that infects others sjDontaneous- 
ly. Nothing in his person marked the captive 
of romance, — neither hollow cheeks, nor fur- 
rowed brow, nor neglected beard, nor ungar- 
tered hose. The frank features had, from long 
confinement, lost the florid complexion which 
formerly had ratlier vulgarized them, and were 
further improved by a shade more of thought- 
fulness. But the bright; smile lingered on the 
lips, and he was still to be distihguished by a 
certain fastidious neatness of person which, in 
one of less intellect, would have degenerated 
into dandyism. 



60 ^ THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

*' ' Will you come and visit my cell,' cried 
Meagher, after lie had played innumerable 
games of ball, with all the^ ardor of a boy of 
fifteen, until brow and bosom glowed with ani- . 
mation. ' Yes, do, pray, show us how you man- 
age to disguise the fetters, — to drape your situ- 
ation, as the French would say,''gayly replied 
one of our party. We ascended a stone stair- 
case, the walls of which were so painfully white 
they made one wink. The very cleanliness of 
a jail has something cutting and icy about it. 
At length Meagher called out, ' Halt,' and we 
found ourselves at the end of a long corridor, 
which contained about twenty cells. At the 
door of each hung an enormous iron padlock, 
to secure the prisoners at night. ' That is mine,^ 
said Meagher, pointing to the fourth or fifth in 
the row. Was it magic, or a dream, or what ? 
This a place of punishment ! Why, I never saw 
anything so coquettish, so graceful, so fanciful, 
so fairy-like as this tiny boudoir. Imagine a 
little room, about the size of an ordinary pan- 
try, lighted from the top by a large skylight, 
with bare whitewashed walls, neither fireplace 
nor stove, and a cold stone floor. These were 
the materials Meagher had to work on, and this 
dreary spot, which would have struck a less 



IN CLONMEL JAIL. 61 

brave heart with helpless despair, he had with 
his own hands converted into a genuine expres- 
sion of the poetry which formed the basis of 
his character and genius. 

" A warm crimson cloth lined the walls, and 
at oi:ce removed the fever-hospital look of the 
place. Handsome French prints hung in rich 
profusion, whose lively colors and fresh gildings 
were fresh and animating. 

" A pretty sofa bedstead completely filled the 
farthest end of the cell. Round three sides of 
it were ranged well-stored book-shelves, just 
within reach of his hand ; he thus lay nestled 
in books, and in the long winter evenings, de- 
prived of fire, could still read comfortably. 
Just over the foot of the bed, so that it was the 
object his eye most constantly greeted, was 
placed a magnificent crucifix carved in ivory — 
so much for the ' iufidel.' 

" Here and there among the pictures hung 
souvenirs or trophies he prized. A battered 
hat of O'Gorman's which had seen the hill- 
side ; an enormous pipe — which had belonged 
to Robert Blum, the Franhfort patriot ; a chaos 
of netted purses, segar and watch cases, and 
many other female tokens of interest in the 
young rebel ; a bright warm carpet, a table, 



62 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

and two or three chairs, all of tasteful form — 
completed the furniture. An exquisite propri- 
ety of cleanliness gave a singular look to this 
pleasant spot. An atom of dust seemed never 
to have rested on it. The snowy coverings of 
tlie bed and dressing-table — the vase of spring 
flowers, so fresh and sparkling, which stood be- 
side his open book — the gay pictures, many of 
them beautiful female heads — the newly bound 
books — all spoke of repose and order. It was 
utterly impossible to imagine one's self in a con- 
demned cell ; and such is the influence of exter- 
nal things on the mind, that we were all talking 
and laughing as merrily in ten minutes as if the 
scenes at Clonmel, with Monaghan and Black- 
burne as principal figures, had only happened 
in a Christmas pantomime." 

Thus was Meagher in prison — with a doubtful, 
although judicially pronounced fate before him. 
The scaffold with all its horrors had no de- 
pressing influence upon him. He was as cheer- 
ful in the prison of the condemned, as he was 
resolute in the dock. Having performed his 
duty with fidelity to his country, he was willing 
to accept all the responsibility — be it death, 
or be it perpetual banishment. It was but a 
few days after the interview above described 



IN PRISON. , 63 

that tlie four condemned prisoners — Meagher, 
O'Brien, McManns, and O'Donoglme — were 
conveyed to Dublin under an escort of Dra- 
goons. They were hurried off from the Clon- 
mel jail at three o'clock in the morning, and 
were far on their route before daylight. There 
w^as a design planned, and partially prepared, 
to effect a rescue ; but, through treachery on 
the part of the prison chaplain, the purposes of 
the " conspirators" were divulged to the Gov- 
ernment, and hence the prisoners w^ere carried 
off with great haste. It was stated, but I have 
no authority to vouch for the statement, that 
the clergyman referred to made a personal 
visit to Dublin Castle to unburden himself of 
the news, confidentially intrusted to him. At 
all events, the facts were communicated to the 
authorities, and several young men were ar- 
rested by the military at night, while holding 
a secret (but premature) meeting in " the Wil- 
derness," a little glen outside the town of Clon- 
mel. The writer, who was a participant in the 
scheme, as representative from the Cork Coun- 
cil, was not one of the arrested, being in the 
mountains holding converse with the Mulcahies, 
three gallant and gigantic brothers, and other 
stalwart Tipperary farmers, about that time. 




CHAPTER III. 



CONVICT LIFE IN VAN DIEMAN S LAND — ESCAPE AND 
ARRIVAL IN AarERICA. 



Meagher's life in Van Dieman's Land was 
not marked by much variety, if we except the 
fact of his marriage, which occurred some time 
before his escape. The district allotted to him, 
under the privilege of his ticket-of-leave, was a 
mountainous region in the highest point of 
which there nestled a charming piece of water 
called Lake Sorel, and upon the banks of this 
stood the cottage in which he spent his convict 
life, except when he was out on the mountain 
with his gun and his dog, both of which the 
" authorities" condescendingly permitted him to 
own ; or traversing the mountain roads on his 
fleet-footed horse, not a " two-forty" animal of 
this day, but something better — a natural crea- 
ture, with the breath of heaven in his nostrils. 
No one who ever saw Meagher in the saddle 



SKETCHES FROM THE " JAIL JOURNAL." 65 

could fail to be struck by liis masterly horse- 
manship. He looked ever like one of that — 

" Host which Jason might have led 
On the plains of Thessaly !" 

In his solitude at Lake Sorel he sometimes 
luxuriated also in a little yachting, in the small 
boat for which some loving memories of the 
literature of 1848 suggested the name " Spe- 
ranza." Sometimes, too, he would scamper off 
into the convict semi-civilization of Hobart 
Town, which lay within' his district, and dash 
into the merriment of a local election with all 
the gusto, but less of the hearty earnestness, with 
which he flung himself into the Galway election, 
a fcAv years before, when Antony OTlaherty 
was running against the Castle nominee — 
then Attorney-General and now Chief- Justice 
Monahan. The location of Meagher's " ticket- 
of-leave" home in Van Dieman's Land, and 
perhaps as much as it is necessary to give here, 
in order to supply a picture of his mode and 
habits of life, is furnished by the following 
sketches fi-om John Mitchel's " Jail Journal^ 
Describing the first interview Avith Meagher, 
after their parting in the Green-street Court- 
house, in Dublin, Mitchel — who, in company 



66 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

with his friend and fellow- prisoner, John Martin, 
started from Bothwell to visit Meagher in his 
high mountain home — says in his Journal : 

" It now began to grow dusk, for we had 
been four hours and a half on the way ; and 
the evening was fast growing dark, when we 
heard the gallop of three horses, and a loud 
laugh well known to me. We went to the door ; 
and in a minute Meagher and O'Doherty had 
thrown themselves from their horses ; and as 
we exchanged greeting — I know not from what 
impulse, whether from buoyancy of heart, or 
hizarre perversity of feeling — we all laughed till 
the woods rung around ; laughed loud and long 
and uproariously, till two teal rose startled from 
the reeds on the lake shore, and flew screaming 
to seek a quieter neighborhood. 

" I suspect there was something hollow in that 
laughter, though at the time it was hearty, vo- 
ciferous, and spontaneous. But even in laugh- 
ter the heart is sad ; and curses, or tears, just 
then, might have become us better. 

" Both these exiles looked fresh ancl vigor- 
ous. Kevin O'Doherty I had scarcely ever met 
before ; but he is a fine, erect, noble-looking 



ON THE MOUNTAIN. 67 

young man, with a face well bronzed with air 
and exercise." 

At a later period Mitchel paid another visit 
to his friend at Lake Sorel. This time Mrs. 
Mitchel was with him. She had but recently 
come with her children to share her husband's 
exile. This is the way Mitchel describes their 
meeting with Meagher on that occasion : — 

*' We still ascended, the mountain becoming 
wilder and steeper at every mile, until we were 
fall two thousand feet above the plain of Ross. 
Here an opening among the trees gave us a 
view over the low country we had left, wide, 
arid, and parched in aspect, with ridge after 
ridge of rugged-looking wooded hills stretching 
far towards the Pacific eastward. High and 
grim to the northeast towered the vast Ben Lo- 
mond ; and we could trace in the blue distance 
that valley of St. Paul's, where we had left 
O'Brien wandering on his lonely way. We were 
now almost on the ridge where our track crossed 
the summit of the western range ; we had dis- 
mounted, and I was leading the horse up the re- 
maining steep acclivity, when we suddenly saw 
a man on the track above us ; he had a gun in 



68 THOMAS FEANCIS MEAGHER. 

his hand, on his head a cabbage-tree hat, and at 
his feet an enormous dog. When he observed 
us he sung out Coo, ee ! the cry with which 
people in the bush make themselves heard at a 
distance. Coo, ee I I shouted in reply ; when 
down came bounding dog and man together. 
The man was Meagher, who had walked four 
miles from his cottage to meet us ! the dog was 
Brian, a noble, shaggy greyhound, that be- 
longed to McManus, but of which Meagher had 
now the charge. 

" We continued our ascent merrily, and soon 
knew — though the forest was thick all around 
us — that we had reached the mountain-top, by 
the fresh breeze that blew on our brows, from 
the other side. 

" And now — how shall I describe the won- 
drous scene that breaks upon us here — a sight to 
be seen only in Tasmania, a land where not only 
the native productions of the country, but the 
very features of nature herself, seem formed on 
a pattern the very reverse of every model, form, 
and law, on which the structure of the rest of 
the globe is put together ; a land wdiere the 
mountain-tops are vast lakes, where the trees 
strip of bark instead of leaves, and where the 
cherry-stones grow on the outside of the cher- 



A MOUNTAIN LAKE. 69 

ries. After climbing full two thousand feet we 
stand at one moment on the brink of the steep 
mountain, and behold the plain of Ross far be- 
low ; the next minute, instead of commencing 
onr descent into a valley on the opposite side, 
w^e are on the edge of a great lake, stretching 
at least seven miles to the opposite shore, held 
in here by the mere summits of the mountain- 
range, and brimming to the very lips of the cup 
or crater that contains it. A cutting of twenty- 
five feet in depth would, at this point, send its 
w^aters plunging over the mountain, to form a 
new river in the plains of Eoss. At another 
part of its shore, to the northwest, a similar 
canal would drain it into the Lake river, which 
flows along the foot of the mountains on that 
side. As it is, the only outlet is through Lake 
Crescent and the Clyde ; and so it comes to 
fertilize the vale of Bothwell, and bathe the 
roots of our trees at Nant Cottage. 

" We pass the Dog's-head promontory and 
enter a rough, winding path cut among the 
trees, which brings us to a quiet bay, or deep 
curve of the lake, at the head of which, facing 
one of the most glorious scenes of fairy-land, 
with the clear waters rippling at his feet, and a 
dense forest around and behind it, stands our 



70 THOMAS FEANCIS MEAGHER. 

friend's quiet cottage. A little wooden jetty 
runs out some yards into the lake ; and at an- 
chor, near the end of the jetty, lies the " Spe- 
ranza," a new boat built at Hob art Town, and 
hauled up here through Bothwell, a distance of 
seventy-five miles, by six bullocks. 

" On the verandah we are welcomed by the 
lady of this sylvan hermitage, give our horses 
to Tom Egan to be taken care of, and spend a 
pleasant hour, till dinner-time, sauntering on 
the lake shore. After dinner a sail is proposed. 
Jack is summoned, an old sailor kept here by 
Meagher to navigate the boat ; the stern-sheets 
are spread with opossum skins, rugs, and 
shawls ; the American flag is run up, and we 
sally forth, intending to visit the island, and see 
how the oats and potatoes are thriving. For 
Meagher means to be a great farmer also ; and 
has kept a man on the island several months, 
ploughing, planting, and sowing. The after- 
noon, however, proves rough ; the wind is too 
much ahead, and when a mile or two from the 
shore we give up the trip to the island and put 
the boat about. She stoops, almost gunwale 
under, and goes flying and staggering home. 
The afternoon had become raw, and we enjoyed 
the sight of the wood-fire illuminating the little 



HIS ESCAPE. 71 

crimson parlor and the gaylj-bound books that 
loaded the shelves. Pleasant evening of course, 
except when we spoke of Ireland, and the mis- 
erable cUhris of her puny agitators, which are 
fast making the name of Irishman a word of 
reproach all over the world." 

And so Meagher passed his life in the Tas- 
manian wilderness until, by the help of Provi- 
dence, and P. J. Smyth, and the New York 
Irish Directory, and, more than all perhaps, by 
his own daring courage, after he resigned his 
parole, defied the British jail authorities to 
arrest him, intrusted himself to the buffetings 
of a stormy sea in an open boat, braved the 
desolation of an uninhabited island for some 
hours, and, after much weary travail, reached 
Pernambuc©, and from thence finally landed in 
New York, as we have already stated in a pre- 
vious chapter. 





CHAPTER lY. 



MEAGHER AS A SOLDIER HE RAISES AND TAKES 

COMMAND OF THE IRISH BRIGADE. 



The first overt act of civil war in the IJDited 
States — a war which endured from April, 1861, 
to April, 1865, occurred on the 12th day of April, 
1861, when a formal demand was made by Gen. 
Beauregard, then commanding the Confederate 
forces at Charleston, upon Maj. Anderson, of 
the U. S. army, to surrender the federal strong- 
hold, Fort Sumter, and the property of the gen- 
eral government which it contained, into the 
hands of the government recently established at 
Montgomery, Ala., and claiming recognition as 
the government of the " Confederate States of 
America." How the demand of the insurgent 
general was met by Maj. Anderson, and the re- 
sult which followed in the terrific bombardment 
of Sumter, from the forts at Moultrie, Sullivan's 
Island, and Cummings' Point, and its surrender 
on the 13th, are known. It is not within the 



PEEPAEATION FOR WAR. 73 

province of this volume to dilate upon the 
political causes which led to the civil war, the 
preliminary acts of which called into existence 
Meagher's Irish Brigade in the Army of the 
Potomac, an organization which, by its valor in 
the field, in its patient endurance on the march, 
its invaluable labors in the fortifications, and 
its promptness to participate heartily and un- 
flinchingly in every battle fought while it con- 
tinued disintegrated by the fearful losses sus- 
tained by the regiments composing it, have en- 
titled every man who stood in its ranks to the 
highest honor which a true soldier covets, and 
to the lasting gratitude of the country which it 
helped to preserve from a disaster the most de- 
plorable that could befall any country — national 
dissolution. 

Previous to the attack on Fort Sumter, it was 
a matter of some doubt whether the secession 
of the Southern States would be resisted by 
force of arms. In the latter end of March and 
the early part of April great indecision was 
said to prevail in the Cabinet councils, and it 
was only on the 2d of the latter month that 
orders were issued to put the army and navy of 
the United States on a war footing. Even when 
an expedition was fitted out in New York, con- 



74 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

sisting of eight vessels of war and transports, 
with 2G guns and 1,380 men, it was still ru- 
mored that the object was to settle our claims 
with Spain, and not to make any coercive de- 
monstration against the South. But with the 
echo of the first gun at Sumter, all doubt as to the 
course to be pursued was dispelled, and if any 
hesitancy existed in the minds of Mr. Lincoln 
or his Cabinet it vanished then. The concilia- 
tory policy of Gen. Scott to let our erring sis- 
ters depart in peace received no favor. The 
whole people of the North rose as one man to 
resent the insult offered to the National Flag. 
Hence the call issued by the President on the 
15th of April for 75,000 of the militia of all 
the States, was answered with a unanimity with 
which no appeal of a similar kind was ever re- 
ceived before. The quota of New York under 
this call was about 13,000 men ; and they were 
speedily furnished. In the Metropolis the most 
ardent enthusiasm prevailed amongst all classes. 
The ranks of the militia regiments were rapidly 
filled up. Men of all professions and occupa- 
tions hurried forward to sustain the national 
cause — judges, lawyers, merchants, journalists, 
men of all parties, all religious denominations, and 
all nationalities. Foremost among them were 



r 

THE SIXTY-NINTH REGIMENT. 75 

to be found the citizens of Irish birth and extrac- 
tion, who almost en masse flung themselves into 
the movement, which had set the heart of the 
entire nation throbbing with patriotism. 

The Sixty-Ninth Regiment New York State 
Militia, then commanded by Col. Michael Cor- 
coran, was among the first to respond to the 
call. This regiment and its gallant colonel had 
just made themselves famous by refusing to pa- 
rade in honor of the Prince of Wales on his 
visit to New York, for which act Col. Corcoran 
was subjected to the form of a Court Martial, 
the proceedings of which were abandoned sub- 
sequently, public opinion strongly sustaining 
him in the alleged violation of militar}^ rules. 
The Sixty-Ninth was composed exclusively of 
Irishmen, all of whom had experienced the ma- 
lignity of British rule in Ireland, and some of 
them being political exiles from their native 
country. Under these circumstances their re- 
fusal to participate in a fulsome ovation to the 
representative of the British Crown, was hearti- 
ly sustained by the great majority of the peo- 
ple. While they thus declined the service de- 
manded of them in a street parade, on the 11th 
of October, 1860, the Sixty-Ninth were among 
the foremost in 1861 to proffer their services in 



70 THOMAS FKANCIS MEAGHER. 

the field of battle in defence of the Constitution 
and the flag of their country. The same spirit 
which animated them permeated all classes of 
Irish citizens. Although by conviction as by 
tradition united to the party of the Democracy, 
and politically opposed to the party then in 
power, no factious opposition restrained the 
Irish citizens from giving a generous support to 
the Administration in its attempt to suppress 
rebellion. In the ranks of nearly every regi- 
ment in the Federal army, but more especially 
those raised in New York, citizens of Irish birth 
were largely represented. j | 

The services of the Sixty-Ninth being accept- 
ed the regiment left New York for Washington 
on the 23d April, 1861. Rarely was there wit- 
nessed such a scene of enthusiasm in the Me- 
tropolis as when this gallant regiment, number- 
ing a thousand rank and file, marched down 
Broadway from their headquarters en route to 
the National Capital, to participate in its de- 
fence. So great was the anxiety to join the 
ranks that 3,000 men offered themselves, but by 
orders from headquarters Col. Corcoran was 
compelled to accept only the regulation number 
of one thousand, which, Avitli the officers and 
band, made in all 1130 men. At that critical 



DEPARTURE OF THE SIXTY-NINTH. 77 

period the departure of the Sixty-Ninth, as well 
as the other militia regiments who started about 
the same time, was an important event. From 
an early hour in the morning immense crowds 
of men, women, and children from all parts of 
the city might be seen flocking into Broadway 
until, as the day advanced, that highway was so 
completely blocked up that neither omnibuses, 
carriages, nor carts could find a passage-way. 
Through the long weary hours of the day, un- 
der a sun almost as hot as that of July, this 
dense crowd filled the side-walks. They had 
come from Jersey City, Hoboken, Brooklyn, 
Williamsburg, and from localities all along the 
Harlem railroad as far as Hartford, Connecti- 
cut, to witness the departure of the sturdy Six- 
ty-Ninth. The march from the headquarters in 
Prince street, which took place rather late in 
the day owing to the delay on the part of the 
authorities in distributing arms to the men, was 
a perfect ovation. The fire companies were 
drawn up in line and saluted the heroes as they 
passed. Several civic societies joined in the 
procession. At Canal, Grand, and Cortlandt 
streets the excitement was intense, and when 
the steamer James Adger moved off from the 
pier amid the plaudits of the multitude, the fir- 



78 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

ing of cannon, and the vessels at the clocks clip- 
ping their flags in recognition of the valor and 
self-sacrifice of the gallant fellows who so 
promptly threw themselves into the front of 
danger, the scene was equally sublime and ex- 
hilarating. Many w^ere the thrilling scenes 
enacted on that day which must have tried the 
souls of the departing heroes ; the final grasp 
of the hand from friendly bystanders as each 
recognized an acquaintance in the column ; the 
warmer salute of wife, and sister, and sweet- 
heart, who would occasionally burst through the 
ranks to take a tearful and passionate farewell, 
with a demonstrative eloquence of grief pecu- 
liar to the Irish female heart. When the James 
Adger moved off from the pier amid the tumul- 
tuous plaudits of the assembled masses, there 
was many a one in that vast crowd who had no 
voice to speak her pride, or utter her lamenta- 
tion, but who might well have said, as she gazed 
on the fast-fading deck of the vessel, — 

" So long 
As he conld make me with liis eye or ear 
Distinguish him from others, he did keep 
The deck, with glove, or hat, or handkerchief, 
Still waving as the fits and stirs of his mind 
Could best express how slow his soul sailed on — 
How swift his ship." 






ENTERS THE AEMY. 79 

We dwell upon the participation of the Sixty- 
Ninth in the opening scenes of the war, because 
in that regiment was ia a measure to be found 
the nucleus of the Irish Brigade, subsequently 
commanded by Thomas Francis Meagher. It 
was upon the officers and men who shared the 
perils of the first three months' campaign, and 
acquitted themselves so splendidly at the first 
battle of Bull Kan, that Meagher depended for 
the frame-work of that Brigade whose name 
shall be ever memorable in' American history. 
And well was the Sixty-Ninth represented in 
the new organization by such men as Patrick 
Kelly, James Cavanagh, James Kelly, Col. 
Quinlan, Lieutenants Hart, Smith, McQuade, 
Maxwell O'Sullivan, and other officers who dis- 
tinguished themselves in the three months' 
campaign, and nearly all of whom subsequently 
sealed their devotion to the Irish Brigade, and 
the cause for which it was organized, with their 
blood, and some of them with their lives. 

It was at this juncture that Thomas Francis 
Meagher entered the military profession, in 
which he since performed such signal service to 
the country, and won so much honor for his own 
name as a soldier. Besolved not to remain be- 
hind those of his countrymen who in their ca- 



80 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

pacitj as a portion of the State militia had 
ah'eady gone forth to battle at the crj, then 
hourly repeated, " Washington is in danger !" 
Meagher raised a company of Zouaves for the 
Sixty-Ninth, a band of dashing intelligent 
young Irishmen, a hundred and forty-five 
strong, and being chosen captain he proceeded 
with them to join the regiment, then stationed 
in the vicinity of Washington. 

After the disastrous battle of Bull Kun a 
cloud overshadowed the ^National cause. The 
enemies of the republic, both in the North and 
South, were jubilant ; its friends, for a time, 
disheartened. The monarchical element of Eu- 
rope exulted in the anticipated decay of our in- 
stitutions, and its statesmen pointed with scoff- 
ing fingers at what they, in their shallow phi- 
losophy, believed to be the failure of "the 
experiment" of self-government. But the ines- 
timable prize of a great united nation, a gov- 
ernment and laws which protected alike those 
born under the national flag and those who 
voluntarily swore allegiance to it — and thus 
made the country their own, not by accident, but 
by choice — was not thus easily to be surren- 
dered. The clouds of fear and doubt soon 
broke into a storm of patriotic inspiration. The 



.PARTY PREDILECTIONS. 81 

people, who were for the moment stricken with 
the vain fear tliat the Union could not be held 
together, because a few thousand untrained and 
inexperienced troops, who had never been un- 
der fire, were defeated in the first shock of bat- 
tle, soon returned to their faith in the solidity 
of the Republic, and resolved that its integrity 
must be preserved at every sacrifice. Fresh 
troops were raised almost spontaneously, and 
preparations were* made by the Government to 
bring an effective army into the field. 

Even upon the Irish mind, which was always 
faithful to the flag, and from its natural tem- 
perament was never inclined to be despondent, 
an impression of partial alienation was made 
in this critical period. Party predilections and 
prejudices for a time swayed it, and almost got 
the better of it. Many of those with whom 
Irish- American citizens were accustomed to act 
in political life, entertained doubts of the capa- 
city of the Government to maintain the Union 
unbroken. Some honestly questioned the wis- 
dom of enforcing an alliance Avhich was obnox- 
ious to one of the parties interested ; and a few 
held that there was no constitutional power ex- 
isting in the Government to compel the South- 
ern States to remain within the Union after 



82 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

they had deckired by the voice of their legisla- 
tures and conventions to withdraw their con- 
sent to the original compact. It was at this 
critical moment, and under these somewhat in- 
auspicious circumstances, that Meagher ap- 
pealed to his countrymen to form an Irish Bri- 
gade, which it was intended to place under the 
command of Gen. James Shields, a soldier who 
had already prominently established in his own 
person the military reputation of his race. 
With this intention Meagher applied to the Sec- 
retary of War for authority to raise a brigade, 
which he immediately received by telegram. 
As an evidence of the vehemence with which 
Meagher at this time conjured his countrymen 
to join the ranks of the national army, I will 
quote a few extracts from a speech delivered at 
Jones' Woods, at the festival for the benefit of 
the widows and orphans of the soldiers of the 
Sixty-Ninth who fell at the battle of Bull Kun : 

" Never, I repeat it, was there a cause more 
sacred, nor one more just, nor one more urgent. 
No cause more sacred, for it comprehends all 
that has been considered most desirable, most 
valuable, most ennobling to political society 
and humanity at large. No cause more just, 



SPEECH AT JONES' WOODS. 83 

for it involves no scheme of conquest, or subju- 
gation, contemplated no disfranchisement of 
the citizen, excluding the idea of provincialism 
and inferiority, aiming only at restoration of 
franchised powers and property, which were en- 
joyed by one people and one republic, and 
which, to be the means of happiness, fortune, 
and renown to millions, must be exercised and 
held in common under one code of national 
laws, one flag, and one Executive. 

" No cause more urgent, for intrigues, per- 
fidies, armed legions, the hatred and cupidity of 
foreign courts assail it ; and every reverse with 
which it is visited ' serves as a pretext for the 
desertion of the coward, the misrepresentation 
of the politician, whose nation is his pocket. 
The proffered compromises of men who, in the 
name of peace, would capitulate to treason and 
accept dishonor ; encourage the designs of kings 
and queens and knaves, to whom this great 
commonwealth, with all its wondrous acquisi- 
tions and incalculable promise, has been, until 
within the last few weeks, a source of envy, 
vexation, alarm, and discomfiture, presenting as 
it did nobler scenes of activity and progress 
than their estates could show — sheltering and 
advancing the thousands whom their rods «>nd 



S4: THOMAS FKANCIS MEAGHER. 

bayonets had swept beyond the sea, and, like 
the mighty genius of the ocean confronting the 
ship of Vasco de Gama, uprising here to repel 
the intrusion which would establish on the seas 
and islands of the New World the crowned mo- 
nopolies and disabling domination of the Old. 
Will the Irishmen of New York stand by this 
cause — resolutely, heartily, with inexorable 
fidelity, despite of all the sacrifices it may cost, 
despite of all the dangers it may compel them, 
despite of the bereavements and abiding gloom 
it may bring on such homes as this day miss the 
industry and love of the dead soldiers of the 
Sixty-Ninth, but in some measure to console 
and succor which the festivities of this day have 
taken place ? For my part, I ask no Irishman 
to do that which I myself am not prepared to 
do. My heart, my arm, my life are pledged to 
the national cause, and to the last it will be 
my highest pride, as I conceive it to be my 
holiest duty and obligation, to share its fortunes. 
I care not to what party the Chief Magistrate 
of the Kepublic has belonged. I care not upon 
what plank or platform he may have been elect- 
ed. The platform disappears before the Con- 
stitution, under the injunction of the oath he 
took on the steps of the Capitol the day of his 



ORGANIZES A BRIGADE. 85 

inauguration. The party disappears in the 
presence of the nation — and as the Chief Ma- 
gistrate, duly elected and duly sworn, is bound 
to protect and administer the national property 
for the benefit of the nation, so should every 
citizen concur with him in loyal and patriotic 
action, discarding the mean persuasions and 
maxims of the local politician — and substitut- 
ing the national interests, the national efficien- 
cy, the national honor, for the selfishness, the 
huckstering, or the vengeance of a party." 

Meagher at once set to work to organize a 
brigade. He authorized Col. Nugent to raise 
the first regiment, to be known as the Sixty- 
Ninth New York Volunteers, which the colonel 
did most efficiently and with little delay. The 
Zouaves, which served under Meagher in the 
three months' campaign, were called together 
by their old commander, and from among them 
he selected the officers of the Second Kegiment 
of the Brigade. He then proceeded to organ- 
ize the batteries. Captain William Hogan, an 
experienced artillery officer, who formerly com- 
manded the "Napper Tandy Light Artillery," 
of Brooklyn, enlisted one battery, and took 
command of it. Captain McMahon, who served 



86 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

as first lieutenant in the Sixty-Ninth militia, 
enlisted men for the second battery, and also 
took command of that organization. Enlist- 
ment went on briskly in New York. Men flocked 
in crowds to the headquarters of the brigade at 
No. 596 Broadway, above the Metropolitan Ho- 
tel, and w^ere enrolled. The press of the city 
was loud in its commendation of the patriotism 
of the Irish citizens. At that time — it is worthy 
of note and highly honorable to the gallant fel- 
lows who then joined the service — there was no 
bounty offered by the State or the Government, 
as at a subsequent period ; and that there was 
not one of those who enlisted who could not 
have earned at his ordinary civil occupation ten 
times more than the scanty soldier's pay of 
thirteen dollars a month. Yet they cheerfully 
resigned everything — home, comfort, and com- 
petence, to accept the hardships, dis6omforts, 
and dangers of a soldier's life ; many of them 
to meet the stern terrors of death in defence of 
their country. There were busy scenes in that 
long unfurnished room , where there was little, 
one would suppose, either to attract or inspire. 
A solitary chair, a few benches, a single desk, a 
few placards on the walls announcing that men 
would be received there for the Irish Brigade — 



ORGANIZES A BRIGADE. 87 

this was the extent of the furniture. Yet here, 
with all its uninviting interior, was created that 
historic brigade w^hich so often turned the tide 
of battle, and in so many bloody fields won an 
imperishable renown. But there was a mind at 
work in that room — unprepossessing as it was — 
endowed with marvellous gifts to control by its 
firmness, and to win by its genial instincts, — to 
draw towards itself all that was refined, manly, 
and honest which came within the circle of its 
wondrous fascination ; for Meagher was present 
there day by day, attending to all the details of 
the organization, until the brigade was sent to 
Fort Schuyler. 

The organization in New York being in a con- 
dition of progress which left no doubt of its suc- 
cess, Meagher proceeded to Boston, and at an 
immense meeting held in the Music Hall, pre- 
sided over by Gov. Andrew, called upon his 
countrymen to rally in defence of the Constitu- 
tion. In his speech on that occasion he aroused 
the enthusiasm of the Boston people to the 
highest pitch. The Boston Post, in speaking of 
it, said : — " His speech ere this has been read 
by thousands, yet its effect upon his auditors 
can only be guessed at. More argumentative 
throughout than he is wont to be, he plainly told 



00 THOxMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

tlie Irisli-Americau his duty at this crisis. * '^ 
^ ^5- * ^e are gratified that Col. Meagher 
has received so solid and satisfactory an assu- 
rance of the interest the citizens of Boston take 
in the new Irish Brigade, and of their desire to 
see the gallant Shields in command of a body 
of men of which he may feel proud." 

The organization of the Twenty-eighth and 
Twenty-ninth Massachusetts Regiments was the 
result of Meagher's efforts in Boston. But 
when their organization was nearly complete, 
Gov. Andrew, breaking faith with CoL Meagher 
and the gallant Irishmen who responded to his 
appeals, took possession of these regiments for 
a time, and they were therefore altogether sepa- 
rated from the Irish Brigade. True to the 
mean and miserable instincts begot of igno- 
rance, and that ungenerous and stupid policy 
which has controlled all his actions in regard to 
citizens of foreign birth, Gov. Andrew endeav- 
ored to withhold these regiments from the Irish 
Brigade, and appointed natives of Massachu- 
setts as their officers, to the exclusion of every 
Irishman. Meagher, however, had afterwards 
the satisfaction of having- both recjiments under 
his command — first the Twenty-ninth, and then 
the Twenty-eighth. The Twenty-ninth, whicli 



COL. RICHARD BYRNES. §9 

had become exclusively a Yankee regiment, 
fought with the Irish Brigade all through the 
Peninsular campaign from Fair Oaks to Harri- 
son's Landing, and subsequently at Antietam, 
and fought so gallantly and assimilated so 
heartily with the Brigade, that Meagher used to 
say that they were " Irishmen in disguise." The 
Twenty-eighth Massachusetts was substituted 
for the Twenty-ninth a few days before the first 
battle of Fredericksburg. The Twenty-eighth 
had always preserved its Irish character and or- 
ganization. It carried the green colors, and at 
the time it joined the Irish Brigade was com- 
manded by as splendid a specimen of an Irish- 
man and a soldier as ever served a friend or 
confronted a battery, Col. Richard Byrnes. He 
was formerly a sergeant in the regular United 
States Cavalry, and was killed at Fredericks- 
burg while in command of his regiment. A 
more gallant or devoted officer never fell in the 
ranks of battle. He was endowed with all the 
social and sterling qualities which endear a man 
most closely to his fellows. 

While in Boston on this mission, Meagher 
made a magnificent speech in the Music Hall 
on the 23d of June, which was intended as an 
ample explanation of the reasons whiah induced 



90 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

him to enter the army on the side of the Gov- 
ernment. As a brilliant piece of imagery, re- 
markable also for its lofty sentiments, it has 
never been excelled by the brilliant orator him- 
self. It is thus worthy of a place in full in this 
volume, but I must reserve it for a new chapter. 




CHAPTER Y. 



THE BOSTON SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 



On the 23d of June, 1863, a vast crowd as- 
sembled at Music Hall, Boston, to hear an 
appeal from Col. Meagher in behalf of the 
Irish Brigade. 

Meagher commenced his speech bj referring 
to the many battle-fields on which the Irish sol- 
dier has distinguished himself in Europe and 
the far East, claiming that his footprints have 
been left in almost every camp, and on almost 
every battle-field of modern times. " In most 
of these quarrels which I have enumerated," he 
said — " in most of these causes to which I have 
referred, it is not exaggeration for me to say, 
that the Irish have distinguished themselves 
pre-eminently. Some of these quarrels, and 
some of these causes have been excellent, ex- 
emplary, unimpeachable ; others have been of 
little, or no consequence ; others have been 



92 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

bad ; the last that I have mentioned has been 
execrable. 

" To build up the power of England, to estab- 
lish her ascendancy in every part of the world, 
this I, for one, can never estimate as a cause 
for which I would hand the laurel to a single 
Irish soldier. But good or bad, weighty or 
trivial, commendable or execrable, the valor of 
the Irish soldier has been eminent and con- 
spicuous, though there may have been some 
misgivings, and ' compunctious visitings' on the 
part of those who fought, that the cause was 
not all that they desired. -But at last, having 
traversed the world, and flashed his sword un- 
der every sky, the Irish soldier has here, upon 
this continent, at this hour, a cause, the justice, 
the sanctity, the grandeur of which can neither 
be exaggerated nor impeached. 

" What is that cause ? Is it the cause of the 
Government, which, legitimately elected, the 
expression of the popular will, should be im- 
plicitly, unequivocally, and absolutely obeyed ? 
They who affront this Government, and they 
w^ho refuse to it allegiance, strike not at the 
Government, but at the people. 

" Who is at arms, and who strikes against this 
Government? The hot, violent, and inordinate 



U 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 93 

Southerner. And why ? What charge of op- 
pression has he to base his armed resistance to 
the Government upon ? What single grievance 
is recorded upon his banner to justify his re- 
volt? What inch of his territory was invaded 
before his overt act of treason ? What single 
guaranty for his State rights which the Consti- 
tution gives him, was in the slightest degree 
violated or impaired? In vain in all their 
speeches ; in vain in all their apologies for 
their revolt ; in vain even in all their rhapso- 
dies, which their partisans here and elsewhere 
pour forth, shall we look to find the least sub- 
stantial reason for that armed rebellion which 
has convulsed the country. So far from having 
been the wronged party, so far from having 
been the party in subjection, the Southerner 
has been the dominant party. For over five- 
and-fifty years he has been the ruling party. 
He has sat in the Presidential chair during that 
period, extending over half a century, and more 
than two-thirds the existence of this Republic. 
But in this very fact we find the provocation, 
or, at all events, the reason (if it is not a per- 
version of terms to use that word in this con- 
nection) for his revolt ; for so accustomed was 
be to the luxuries of office, to the domination 



94 THOMAS FEANCIS MEAGHER. 

and power that it brought, that he could not 
reconcile himself to the decision of the popular 
will, which transferred the Executive power to 
other hands. In other words, he substitutes — 
instead of the ballot-box, which has heretofore 
been considered not only sacred and inviolable, 
but conclusive — he substitutes for the rule of 
the ballot-box, the Mexican rule, which is the 
rule of the bayonet and the cartridge-box. But 
against the will of the majority of the people, 
freely and constitutionally expressed as it was, 
and announced emphatically, by one who, on 
account of his private character and his high 
intellectual attainmepts, I wish to speak with 
all due respect — announced by John C. Breck- 
inridge (who is now the boldest and most daunt- 
less apologist for the revolution) to be the fair 
and conclusive expression of the popular will, 
the Southerner rises up and declares, that rather 
than submit to this decision, he will rend tho 
Commonwealth in twain ; and although the re- 
sult may be to doom him to political inferiority, 
still his ambition is such, that he is almost 
ready to exclaim with Lucifer, that he would 
* rather reign in hell, than serve in heaven.' 

" ' But,' they say, ' a man by the name of 
Abraham Lincoln was elected.' Well, was not 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 95 

Abraham Lincoln qualified ? Was lie not of 
the proper age ? Was not he perfectly white ? 
Was his blood attainted ? Was there a curl in 
his hair ? Physically, was there the slightest 
incident which would have impaired or im- 
peached the validity of his election? 'Well, 
no, he was elected on an obnoxious platform !' 
What was that platform ? I really forget what 
that platform was. No matter what it was, no 
matter upon what platform the President may 
have been elected ; no matter by what proces- 
sions of illuminated men his campaign may 
have been conducted ; no matter what appeals 
may have been made to what some gentlemen 
may have considered an excess of humanitari- 
anism, — the moment he took the oath from 
Chief Justice Taney to support the Constitu- 
tion of the United States, that moment the 
platform disappeared from view, and we beheld 
nothing but the Constitution. But whether this 
was the case, or would have been the case, or 
not, with an impetuosity characteristic of the 
region in which they live, the Southerners gave 
the President no opportunity either to make 
good his oath, or to prove that in his estimation 
the Chicago platform was superior to the Con- 
stitution of the United States. They advanced 
4 



96 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

still further ; and, granting what I have said, 
that the Constitution of the United States is 
superior to any platform, however elaborated 
or stringent, which a party ever constructed, 
they point indignantly, and with some irascibil- 
ity, to the doing and saying of some political 
writers and speakers in this latitude, and they 
say — ' Our favorite institutions have been vili- 
fied ; there has been Horace Greeley, in New 
York, writing against us with all the gall which 
his pen, can distil ; and there has been Wendell 
Phillips, still further North, venting his vicious 
eloquence upon these institutions, and upon our 
system of society and labor.' Well, are South- 
ern sensibilities so exquisite that they cannot 
stand the vilification of their institutions ? Does 
abuse, however virulent and vicious it may be, 
justify in any case revolution? What good, I 
might ask with some humor and a good deal of 
sense, what good are democratic institutions, if, 
under those institutions ^M^pp^'cs are not tol- 
erated ? Besides, might not we reciprocate (I 
will not sa}^ recriminate) these accusations? 
But I will only remind the South that their 
speakers have been just as abusive of the North 
as the Northern speakers have been abusive of 
the South. 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 97 

" In a word, we find that there is not one 
substantial reason or pretext for this revohition. 
If Wisconsin, in some of her State laws, has 
been unfaithful or hostile to the South — if Mas- 
sachusetts (I say it with all respect) has been 
unfaithful or hostile in any of her State laws to 
the South — if Indiana or Illinois has been so — 
the Union, at all events, cannot be accused of 
such hostility ; the Union has been faithful to 
the South. So said the Emperor of Kussia the 
other day ; so say we here to-night ; and so will 
impartial history inexorably decide. 

" But here is war — war amongst citizens — 
war amongst brothers — war that brings destruc- 
tion into families that have been interwoven, 
and States that have been almost identified by 
commerce and by social relations with each oth- 
er. How unnatural this war ! How infamous ! 
How horrible ! But who began it ? Does not 
South Carolina stand this day in the presence 
of all that blood which is rising up from the 
fields and woods of Yirginia, from the mountain 
gorges of the Alleghanies, from the prairies of 
Missouri — does not South Carolina stand to-day, 
as these red mists rise to Heaven, and feel con- 
science-smitten that it was she who commenced 
this deadly fray ? 



08 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

" It is unnecessary for me to historically re- 
capitulate the incidents wliich step by step — 
each step quicker than the other — have brought 
the country to the terrible pass in which now 
its honor is at stake, and its dearest interests 
are imperilled. But the apologist of the South- 
erner, admitting all this, granting that the vio- 
lent South has been the first to strike the inter- 
necine blow, in paroxysm of sanctity exclaims, 
' But, let us have peace !' Peace ! Peace ! when 
the ships bearing that flag which no foreign 
enemy ever insulted without redress being de- 
manded and obtained, have been taken into 
the rebel ports as prizes, or burned, or sunk ! 
Peace ! Avhen forts which would have been im- 
pregnable to any force but that of fraud have 
been captured ! Peace ! when mints, which in 
other countries would have had armed guards 
at the doors to protect them from the suspected 
people, have been invaded and our treasure 
carried off! Peace! when our custom-houses 
have been ransacked ! Peace ! when the inof- 
fensive messengers of commerce that Maine, 
Massachusetts, New York, and Pennsylvania 
have sent forth upon the seas, have been over- 
hauled, and their crews carried into port as 
though they were pirates, instead of those who 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 99 

laid violent hands on them ! The Government 
that would counsel peace at such a moment, 
under such circumstances, with such a load of 
dishonor upon its head, with such a harvest of 
insult to thresh out, such a Government would 
indeed deserve to perish. 

"But whence comes this cry of peace? It 
comes from conspirators at the North, in secret 
league with the more honest and courageous re- 
cusants at the South. Who are they ? Nobody 
will accuse me of unfairly aspersing the Demo- 
cratic party. On the two occasions when I had 
the honor as a citizen of recording my vote in 
a Presidential election it has been recorded for 
the Democratic candidates. Upon all occa- 
sions I have been identified with that party, and 
probably when we shall resume our former con- 
dition of peaceful strife (if it is not an Irishism 
to make use of such a phrase) I shall vote as I 
have hitherto done. But now I am no Demo- 
crat. Of me. at all events, it shall not be writ- 
ten upon my grave, should I fall in this cause, 
as was written of an illustrious countryman of 
mine — ' He gave up to party what was meant 
for mankind.' 

" Haviug said so much to dissipate any grow- 
ing impression that there might be that I am 



100 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

radically hostile to the Democratic part}^ or 
that I have swerved away from it, I do not hes- 
itate to say that the conspirators of the North 
are Democrats. The editors of the New York 
Daily News are Democrats, or profess to be so ; 
so the editors of the New York Day Bool:, of the 
Journal of Commerce, and also of the Freeman s 
Appeal — who, making his last appeal — was 
gratified by seclusion within the aqueous walls 
of Fort Lafayette. And why this cry? Be- 
cause they see that the Government, prosecuting 
this war with vigor and intrepidity, and sus- 
tained by earnest enthusiasm, and the liberal 
resources, by the treasure and blood of the peo- 
ple, will maintain itself. Unable to grapple 
with the great question of war or no war ; not 
bold or frank enough to stand up without dis- 
guise, and claim that the Southerners are in the 
right and the Northerners are in the wrong — for 
we must use these geographical distinctions in 
speaking of this matter, though I shrink from 
them with aversion — these men come forward 
with the word ' Peace' on their lips, that so they 
may deal a mortal blow on this Government 
and its just rights. With them is the injunc- 
tion of Lady Macbeth — 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 101 

' To beguile the hour, look like the hour — 
Bear welcome in your lip, your eye, your hand ; 
Look like the flower, but be the serpent under it.' 

" Not content, however, with this general ex- 
clamation of peace, which as a natural conse- 
quence they w^ell know finds an echo in almost 
every generous and even every soldier breast, 
they address themselves especially to every 
Irishman. They have a particular partiality 
for us ; they have a most keen and affectionate 
solicitude, lest w^e should commit ourselves, or 
compromise ourselves ; should take any step 
which might injure our position in the Common- 
wealth hereafter, and they bid us to remember, 
first of all, that in the States of Connecticut 
and Massachusetts, some few years ago, four or 
five, it may be six, some Irish military compa- 
nies were disbanded. Of that act, you know that 
here or not far from this place I did not hesitate 
to pronounce my unqualified condemnation. It 
Avas an act in violent contradiction to the spirit 
of our American institutions and the American 
Constitution ; and if it had been imitated in the 
other States, it might perhaps have deprived the 
Federal Government at this hour of the most 
willing hearts and quickest arms that are now 
engaged in maintaining the honor and suprema- 



102 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

cy of the national flag. But for my part, I 
would consider that my allegiance to the United 
States, to its Chief Magistracy, and to its flag, 
was an equivocal and capricious allegiance if it 
did not forgive even such insults ; and if, for- 
getting them, I did not with a generous enthu- 
siasm resent by a more loyal adherence to the 
Constitution the insult which was in contradic- 
tion of it. 

"The impatient and intense alacrity with 
which the adopted citizens of the United States, 
German as well as Irish, have bounded into the 
conflict, proves how unworthy and unjust, and 
false and scandalous was this proscription. 
Here at this hour I proclaim it in the centre of 
that city where this insult was offered to the 
Irish soldier — ' Know-nothingism' is dead. This 
war, if it brought no other excellent and salu- 
tary fruits, brought with it this result, that the 
Irish soldier will henceforth take his stand 
proudly by the side of the native-born, and will 
not fear to look him straight and sternly in the 
face, and tell him that he has been equal to him 
in his allegiance to the Constitution. But then, 
on a par with such arguments and partaking of 
their character, arguments have been addressed 
personally to myself. These peace-makers. 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 103 

these apostles of submissiou, these propagand- 
ists of national dishonor and national ruin ; 
these meek ancl yet these mischievous gentle- 
men say to me, ' Oh, you were once a revolu- 
tionist, and why should you not be a revolu- 
tionist now?' 

"Now it is a most distressing thing if a gen- 
tleman appears once in a certain character, 
that he is never to change that character, but 
under all circumstances, in every climate, and 
on every stage, is to be the same. If that were 
so, you could not give me credit for versatility 
of genius, to which, perhaps, I may lay claim, 
because, having been a revolutionist in Ireland, 
I am a conservative in America. And what I 
say of myself, I say of hundreds and thousands 
of my countrymen and of Germans and other 
European nationalities — as they were revolu- 
tionists in Europe, they are conservatives in 
the United States. And the reason why, here 
in the United States, under this Constitution, 
under the working of its equal laws, under the 
popular sanction, which industry, and intellect, 
and all just claims and enterprises obtain, the 
European revolutionist finds that security for 
his individuality, and without surrendering 
honor in the nation which he faced death to 
4* 



104 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

acquire for himself, and his country across the 
sea, is because here the dream, which was to 
him a burning dream, by day as well as by 
night, has been realized ; it is because here, 
no wasting theories — impeding which were bay- 
onets and dungeons, and ultimately scaffolds — 
disturb his heart or brain ; and in the consoli- 
dation of that republicanism to which he as- 
pired at home, he beheld all that his ambition 
ascended to, all that his arm w^ould strive for ; 
it is because here the avenues to honor, to for- 
tune, to civic renown, and to political power, 
which were inexorably closed to him by the 
kings and queens of the Old World, have been 
flung open to him by the genius of the Consti- 
tution, the angel of liberty which stands at the 
gates of those avenues, not as the angel stood 
at the gate of Paradise, with flaming sword, to 
repel approach, but to invite all to enter, and 
share the advantages which are beyond. 

"As for the cause of Ireland, and for the 
cause of the South, to these same apologists of 
the South — these peace-makers, these apostles 
of submission, these propagandists of national 
dishonor and ruin, when they ask me how it is 
possible that while I contended for the inde- 
pendence of Ireland, I am opposed to the inde- 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 1U5 

pendence of the South; I answer this, — and I 
trust there is not a single Irishman here who 
wdll gainsay it, — had Ireland been under the 
enjoyment of such privileges and such rights, 
and such a guaranteed independence as South 
Carolina enjoyed, I would not have been here 
to-night, the scaffold would not have been 
stained with one drop of martyr's blood, and 
Ireland would have been spared many a gen- 
eration of mart^Ts and exiles. 

" But not only by the apologists of the South, 
but by Southern gentlemen themselves, by wri- 
ters, arguments similar to those which have 
been mentioned, and yet more personal per- 
haps, have been addressed to me. It would 
seem from statements which appeared in some 
of the Southern papers, before the postal com- 
munication was cut off, as if I were under some 
obligation to join the South and pledge to them 
my sword. My friends know that I have a 
somewhat retentive memory, and I have taxed 
and vexed this memory to know by what means 
I have incurred the slightest obligation to the 
South, unless, indeed, it be this — that one win- 
ter's day I took the steamer from New York 
to Charleston, and there gratuitously delivered 
a lecture which added eight hundred dollars to 



106 THOMAS FEANOiS MEAGHEE. 

a fund for the erection of a monument to the 
memory of Calhoun. 

" Perhaps, indeed, that act of mine in attes- 
tation of my respect of the character and abili- 
ties of John C. Calhoun, imposed an additional 
obligation on me, and I must also give up my 
blood, whatever value there is in that. As the 
South have distinguished themselves of late by 
their financial transactions, I will not pretend 
to differ from them on this question of finance, 
but I am not prepared to draw my sw^ord with 
them. I shall only do so on one contingency, 
and that is, when the South joins the North. 
I have had, indeed, many true and devoted 
friends in the South, and have spent many 
pleasant days there. Some of my countrymen 
had done me the honor, there, to enrol themselves 
in a military company under my name ; but the 
moment I organized a company in New York in 
favor of the Government, they passed a series of 
indignant resolutions, stating that, inasmuch as 
I had proved recreant to the principles which 
had endeared me to my fellow-countrymen and 
the world, the name of the ' Meagher Guards' 
should be blotted out from the colors and the 
books of the company, and that of the ' Emer- 
ald Light Guards' be substituted therefor. The 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 107 

'Hibernian Benevolent Society' of Charleston, 
I saw by a paper, passed a resolution erasing 
my name as an honorary member of the society, 
which was the first intimation I had that such 
a membership was conferred upon me. It must 
have been very honorary, inasmuch as, on one 
or two occasions, when in Charleston profes- 
sion allj^ I had to pay a considerable rent for the 
use of their hall. I speak of these things in 
perfect good-humor. I must add that no hos- 
pitality or honors which could be lavished upon 
me w^ould justify, on my part, even inactivity 
where the Federal Government, stricken at by 
Southern friends, was in peril. In such a case 
my duty to the Government supersedes all other 
considerations. 

"Hence it is that I have appeared in arms 
for the National Government ; and hence it is 
that I have already and do now invoke my 
countrymen to take up arms in the same right- 
eous cause. Will they not obey this invoca- 
tion ? "Will they not press on and imitate their 
gallant countrymen who recently, under the gal- 
lant Mulligan, with only nine hundred men sus- 
tained themselves for four days against four 
thousand men, and surrendered at last because 
for two days they had no water, and who there- 



108 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

by gave the most convincing proof of their 
fideUty to their country. Ought we on the 
Eastern frontier to be less decided in our devo- 
tion to the country or less generous in our evi- 
dence of it ? 

" I will not appeal to the gratitude of Irish- 
men in this invocation to arms. I will not re- 
mind them that when driven from their own 
land, when their huts were pulled down or 
burned above their heads, when turned out by 
the roadside or into the ditches to die, when 
broken in fortune, and when all hope was lost, 
the Irishmen came here and had a new life in- 
fused into them, a fertile soil beneath their feet, 
a favoring sunshine over their heads, and found 
thousands to give them encouraging and sus- 
taining hands. 

"I will not remind my countrymen of the 
sympathy and substantial aid which the people 
of America have given them in all their politi- 
cal struggles. I will not remind them of the 
sympathies then eloquently and enthusiastically 
expressed, what thousands upon thousands of 
dollars they showered into the popular exche- 
quer, when, under the championship of a mighty 
tribune, the great contest for Catholic rights 
and the removal of Catholic disabilites was 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 109 

raging. I will not remind tliem that while Bra- 
zil, Buenos Ajres, New Grenada, almost any 
country with a favoring soil or climate is equal- 
ly open to them, this is the only country where 
the Irish people can reconstruct themselves and 
become a power. I will not remind them that 
wdiilst at home no Irishman, however bold, dare 
speak in public the name of Eobert Emmet, to 
do that name the sacred honor which it de- 
serves ; here in America his last speech is to 
be found in nearly all the school-books of the 
common schools, so that the American boy may 
be fired into patriotism by the recitation of his 
Avords and the remembrance of his death. I 
will not appeal even .to your pride by pointing 
to the houses jon have built for the rich and 
fashionable, to the lines of railroad you have 
constructed, to the fields you have cultivated 
and which fling forth their golden stores 
through these iron arteries of railroads, and 
these other arteries of canals, to sustain the ar- 
my at this moment on the Potomac. 

"I will not appeal even to the pride of Irish- 
men in the contemplation of these great works, 
and ask them if the country shall be dishonored 
>vhere such industry has been expended, and 
such great works have been accomplished. 



110 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

" Neitlier shall I appeal to your resentmrnts, 
to your inveterate and unquenchable hatred of 
England. I will not remind you that England 
is with the South ; that even the anticipation of 
that disastrous affair which occurred the other 
day in Virginia was a matter of rejoicing to 
her ; that all the articles of her leading papers 
were such as to disparage the character, the re- 
sources, and the cause of the Federal Govern- 
ment. 

" I will not remind you that she sent here one 
of the first novelists of the day to throw bril- 
liancy of fiction over the arms, and character, 
and resources of the South, and with colors 
equally fictitious, somewhat more lurid and dark 
to obscure those of the North. ' Oh !' I hear 
some of those idolaters of England exclaim, 
who up to this crisis have had their temple of 
worship in this region, for methinks between 
the Music Hall and Exeter Hall there was a 
railroad, not under ground, but over the ocean. 
It is a fact that after all her denunciations and 
horror of slavery England is for the South, 
where slavery is in full blast, and against the 
North, where it has been long extinct. Who 
would believe it ? I would scarcely do so. Yet 
perhaps it would not be difficult for me to be- 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. Ill 

lieve anytliing of England. Who would believe 
that tliis beneficent apostle of public morals 
and universal emancipation would have been 
guilty of such tergiversation ? Not that Eng- 
land is influenced by a spirit of revenge ; not 
that she remembers what was done at Cam- 
bridge when George Washington took com- 
mand of the revolutionary forces under the old 
tree there ; not that she remembers New Or- 
leans, and that raw levies, which are now 
the subject of so much criticism, met the flower 
of her army and laid it low as the mower lays 
down the grass with his scythe ; not that she 
remembers on whose side the sympathies of the 
American people were in the Russian war : not 
at all. In spite of Shakspeare and Bacon, Eng- 
land is no sentimentalist, no poet, and no phi- 
losopher ; the sturdy old fellow in mahogany 
tops is a practical man of business, a positive 
and absolute Gradgrind, a man for hard facts, 
and nothing else, who makes war only for con- 
siderations which lie deep in the bottom of his 
capacious pocket ; and as he went into India in 
search of diamonds and to open a very exten- 
sive market for his Brumagen ware and calico 
prints, and as he bayoneted the Chinese to 
force opium down their throats, so now he en- 



112 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

courages, favors, and stimulates the South in 
this revokition, and threatens to force the block- 
ade, because cotton is more precious to him 
than political principle ; and he prefers this to 
his own consistency and decency, and the obli- 
gations of good faith and good-will which he 
owes to the nations with whom he has relations 
of commerce and diplomacy. 

" In view of all these circumstances, I shall 
not remind you that every blow dealt against 
the revolution at the South is a blow dealt 
against the plots and schemes of England. I 
strike a loftier strain. Paulo majora canemus. 
Were the Irishman an outlaw here — were he 
divested of all rights of which he is now invest- 
ed — had he no home — even were he proscribed 
and victimized by some political party in power ; 
still would I invoke his arm this night, and in- 
sist that the cause which is now calling forth all 
that is generous and chivalrous in Missouri, all 
that now awakens the eagles of the Alleghanies 
from their eyries, all that now arrays the youth 
and manhood of the country along the banks of 
the Potomac, is well worth fighting for, is well 
worth dying for. Look ! look to that flag. This 
day I stood on Bunker Hill, and, casting my eye 
along the stately shaft I saw it there, with noth- 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 113 

ing between it and God's own sun, and I thought 
as those glorioas hues reflected the favoring 
sunshine that there burst from it memories 
which woukl kindle the dullest into heroism. 
Let no one, however practical he may be, how- 
ever sensible or sagacious he may be, sneer at a 
nation's flag. A national flag is the most sa- 
cred thing that a nation can possess. Libra- 
ries, museums, exchequers, tombs, and statues 
of great men — all are inferior to it. It is the 
illuminated diploma of its authority ; it is the 
imperishable epitomization of its history. As 
I cast my eye along that shaft of granite, what 
did I see there ? I saw Cornw^allis deliver up 
his sword. I saw the British troops evacuating, 
the city of New York. I saw George Washing- 
ton inaugurated as the first President of the 
United States. I saw the lofty brow and gaunt 
frame of Andrew Jackson. I saw the veterans 
of the Peninsular war reeling before the fire of 
Tennessee rifles in the swamps of Louisiana. I 
saw the thunders and lightnings of Lake Erie, 
when Perry commanded them to go forth and 
sweep the friend of the South and the enemy of 
the North from its waters. I saw the American 
sailor pursuing his desolate and heroic way up 
the interminable stream of the Amazon, dis- 



114 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

closing a new world even within the New World, 
to the industry and avarice of the age. I saw, 
in the Bay of Smyrna, the hunted prey of Aus- 
tria rescued beneath the Stars and Stripes. I 
saw the towers of Mexico and causeway over 
which Cortez w^ent. I saw^ those towers and- 
that causeway glistening in a glory greater than 
even Cortez brought to Spain. I saw the 
white bird floating, when the explorer stood 
upon the shore of the land which the human eye 
had never before seen mirrored. These and a 
throng of other grand incidents passed like a 
vision over those stars as I stood beneath them 
this day. Oh, may that flag never incur another 
disaster ! May the troops who carry it into ac- 
tion die where they receive the fatal fire, rather 
than yield one inch of the soil over wdiich it has 
a right to float ! May the troops who carry it 
into action henceforth have this motto written 
upon its folds — ' Death if you will, victory if 
God will give it to us, but no defeat and no re- 
treat!' Oh, if this is not worth fighting for, if 
that flag is not worth fighting for, if the country 
which it typifies and over which it has a right 
to expand its folds, if the principles which it 
symbolizes — if these are not worth fighting 
for — if the country which Mirabeau, with his 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 115 

superb diction, spoke of glowingl}- even during 
its infancy, which De Tocqueville recommended 
witli such calm wisdom and accurate philoso- 
phy to the acceptation and respect of the states- 
men of the Old World, which Burke, with the 
magnificence of his mind, pictured in its devel- 
opment, even when there was but the ' seminal 
principle,' as he said himself, of its magnitude 
upon the earth — if this and these are not worth 
fighting for — infinitely better worth fighting for 
than all the kings and queens, than all the Gib- 
raltars and seraglios, than all the jungles and 
pagodas which Irishmen have fought for under 
Euroj)ean flags, then I stand in the minority. 
But it is not so. If in a minority I stand to- 
night, uttering these words and this invocation, 
it is in a minority of t\>'enty millions against 
ten. This, too, I know — that every Irishman this 
side of Mason and Dixon's line is with me. If 
there is one who is not, let him take the next 
Galway steamer and go home. And, I believe 
this — that he will not only have his expenses 
paid, but something left in his pocket to enable 
him to praise England when he gets there. 

" Let me mention to you one incident, which 
may be tak^n as an indication of the sterling 
devotion of Irishmen, in this contest, to tho 



116 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

Government of wliicli they are so proud. I 
met an Irishman to-daj who, by his steady hab- 
its, his quiet but persistent industry and atten- 
tion to his duties, has been enabled to put by 
several thousand dollars, and he told me that, 
not only because he had faith in the power of 
the Federal Government, but because, even if 
he had not such faith, it would be his duty to 
support it when threatened, he would to-mor- 
row buy five thousand dollars' w^orth of treas- 
ury notes. 

" And here also I will remind you, that for 
every Irishman south of Mason and Dixon's line 
there are hundreds and thousands of Irishmen 
north of it. Here upon these northern shores 
does the Irish emigrant first touch the land of 
which many an evening, gazing on the descend- 
ing sun, he has dreamed and thought it was a 
land of glory. Here it is that his rights have 
been restored. Here it is that the genius of 
his race has displayed itself effectively, and has 
been honorably compensated and crowned. 

" Here was the scene of Fulton's triumph, and 
here Thomas Emmet matured the honors he had 
gathered in his own land. I cannot find in my 
heart to disparage my countrymen down South ; 
but here we Irishmen have the mercantile ac- 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 117 

tivity, the intellectual vigor, the professional 
prowess, and here we Irishmen multitudinously 
preponderate. Never mind the foolish cant 
about 'Irishmen fighting against Irishmen.' It 
is not the first time they have done so. There 
is nothing at all new in that feature of the case. 
That argument has no weight at all with any 
reader of Irish history, or any^one personally 
acquainted with Ireland. At Fontenoy they 
crossed bayonets. 

" In '98 brothers met brothers face to face and 
foot to foot. In the American Eevolution, while 
there was one gallant Fitzgerald riding side by 
side with Washington, there was another charg- 
ing against him, and that was Lord Edward. 
The thing to be ascertained is, the right cause. 
That ascertained, stand by it; fight for it, 
though your brother strike against you ; die for 
it, though one half of your people curse you, 
wdiile the rest accord to your memories their 
tears and grateful benedictions. We have the 
right, for we have the Constitution, which has 
come down to us unimpaired from the day it 
was first formed. We have the flag under which 
this country has made such marvellous progress 
and won such achievements. We have all that 
constitute national guarantees, national honor, 



118 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

and Datioiial history. Then up, Irishmen! np ! 
Take the sword in hand ! Down to the banks 
of the Potomac ! Let those who can, do so ; 
and I believe I speak consistently with the 
views of your esteemed Chief Magistrate, when 
I say that every facility will be accorded those 
Irishmen who wish to enlist under the banner of 
the State ; and I have no doubt that, somehow 
or other — indeed with every facility — the Irish- 
men regimented together, carrying the green 
flag with the Stars and Stripes and the State 
arms, will one day find themselves in the Irish 
Brigade under the command of General James 
Shields. 

" An Irishman never fights so well — it is a 
prejudice, and if not a laudable one, it is, at all 
events, pardonable — an Irishman never fights 
so well as when he has an Irishman for his 
comrade. An Irishman going into the field in 
such a cause as this— in any field, in any cause 
— has this as his strongest impulse, has this as 
his choicest consolation, has this as his richest 
reward in anticipation — that his conduct, if it be 
exemplary and courageous, will reflect honor 
upon that land which he will see no more. He 
therefore wishes that, should he fall, it may be 
into the arms of one of his own faith and blood. 



SPEECH AT MUSIC HALL. 119 

SO that kindred lips may convey to his family 
and relatives, and to all wlio care to hear of 
him, and how he behaved on the fatal day, that 
he died in a way worthy, not only of the cause 
in which he fell, but of the country that gave 
him birth. 

" This is the explanation why Irishmen de- 
sire, earnestly and passionately desire, to be to- 
gether in the fight for the -Stars and Stripes ; 
and I am sure that there is not a native-born 
citizen here, with doctrines however adverse to 
this individualizing of nationalities, in the great 
mass of American citizens, who will not confess 
that it is a natural, a beautiful, a generous, and 
a useful prejudice. 

" The only apprehension which gives me any 
anxiety is, that the Irish Brigade may arrive 
even later than did their prototype at Fontenoy. 
They were the last to come up then, but they 
did the business. I am afraid that the business 
will be over upon the Potomac before our Irish 
Brigade arrives. I trust not — I trust that we 
shall, at all events, participate in the dangers 
as well as in the honors of that conclusive 
victory. 

" It will indeed be a victory worthy of record, 
not merely by such historians as Prescott, who 



120 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

wrote with so luminous a pen upon the imper- 
ishable page, but (if it be not profane to say so) 
it will be a victor}^ worthy to be recorded on the 
pages of the Book of Life itself. 

" The picture unfolds itself to me. The re- 
turning army with that banner; — the woods- 
man from Maine ; the raftsman from the Upper 
Mississippi ; the farmer and mechanic from 
New England ; — all of them in their tattered 
uniforms, and with their riddled flags ; — and 
amidst that crowd, the Green Flag of Ireland, 
the laughing voices, the kindling eyes, the hearty 
nature of those whose vitality is never greater, 
whose intellect is never lAore vivid than when 
danger threatens. Oh, may this picture, rough- 
ly and imperfectly sketched, be realized ; and 
in the presence and high above, the remnants 
of this victorious army, bearing with them the 
Ark of the American covenant, may the Na- 
tional Capital expand its grand and graceful 
proportions, its dome perfected, the great image 
of Liberty standing more erect, and stately, and 
august, and adored than ever ; and high above 
it, announcing victory over the wide world, and 
an auspicious omen that there shall be victo- 
ries from henceforth of no less consequence 
to the United States, the symbolic Eagle of 



FORT SCHUYLEE. 121 

the Republic, soaring upward and upward to 
the sun." 

General Meagher had repeatedly expressed 
to the author an earnest desire that the above 
address should be preserved in a more perma- 
nent form than the columns of the newspapers 
of the day. By printing it in these pages, 
therefore, I have but carried out the wishes of 
the departed in a matter concerning which he 
felt very deeply. 

From Boston Meagher proceeded to Phila- 
delphia, where he set on foot two more regi- 
ments, one of infantry, the other of cavalry. 
Owing to circumstances beyond the control of 
Gen. Meagher, and to the fact that the Irish 
Brigade had gone through the entire of the 
Peninsular campaign before these regiments 
were prepared to take the field, neither of them 
ever joined the Brigade for whi<;h they were 
intended. 

Meantime the New York regiments went into 
camp at Fort Schuyler, on the East Biver. At 
this picturesque point they passed several weeks 
amid all the glories of a splendid Fall season, 
and here Meai^her was in his eiorv. The scenes 
at the Fort were varied, — full of the life-bustle 
G 



122 THOMAS rrtANCIS MEAGHER. 

and activity attendant upon a new military 
organization. The Sundays were especially 
brilliant, when the friends of the soldiers came 
in hundreds from the city to visit them, and 
witness the dress-parades which usually took 
place on those days. The old gray walls of the 
Fort gleamed in the brightness of the sun- 
shine ; — the glacis crowded with anxious and 
proud faces ; — broad-breasted, firm-set, bright- 
ej-ed soldiers drawn up in line outside the 
fort ; — the blue waters sparkling in the un- 
broken sunlight of an Indian summer ; — the 
little revenue cutter reposing upon the unruffled 
river just below the Fort ; — white sails of pleas- 
ure boats flashing along ; — the green shores of 
Willett's Point opposite, with the white houses 
and spires peeping up from the many tinted 
foHage ; — the inspiriting music of Dods worth's 
band, which discoursed most eloquently from 
within the fort ; — the happy groups of visitors 
who wandered to and fro in search of some be- 
loved friend or relative ; — all these combined to 
make a picture of the last Sunda}^ of the Sixty- 
Ninth at Fort Schuyler, which the memory of 
those who witnessed it will not soon part with. 
While the Brigade had its rendezvous at Fort 
Schuyler, Meagher constantly visited it, when- 



AT FAIR OAKS. 123 

Lis labors at tlie recruiting office permitted. 
He would devote liis time during his sojourn 
to supervising the discipline of the men. He 
would speak bright and hopeful words to them 
of the cause in which they had enlisted ; point 
to the glorious flag that floated from the ram- 
parts, and tell them, in the eloquent language 
he knew so well how to employ, that they must 
sustain it in the fight with manly arms and 
stout hearts, and bring it out of the storm of 
battle without spot or stain of dishonor. How 
thoroughly they imbibed his inspiration, and 
how faithfully they obeyed his behests, the 
record of many a terrible field attests. From 
Fair Oaks to Chancellorsville, when the Irish 
Brigade almost lost its identity, with its gallant 
commander, the Stars and Stripes and the green 
flag were borne in every fight, and came out 
riddled with shot ; torn with shells ; ripped 
oftentimes into shreds; but they came out un- 
sullied. During the entire fiery ordeal to which 
Meagher's Brigade was subjected, not a single 
Green Flag fell into the hands of the enemy. 

Above the busy croAvd, while the lines were 
forming. Gen. Meagher stood many a Sunday 
upon the ramparts, surrounded by a host of 
friends, wdth his beautiful and gifted wife be- 



124 THOMAS FKANCIS MEAGHER. 

side him — nee Miss Elizabeth Townsend, to 
whom he was married Nov. 14th, 1855, who 
loved the Brigade no less than the Brigade 
loved and honored her. Such were the scenes 
presented at Fort Schuyler before the Brigade 
broke camp, and hastened to participate in the 
deadly strife in which they afterwards played j 

such a gallant part. It is proper to mention | 

here, that the organization of the Irish Brigade i 

was in a great measure facilitated by the cor- \ 
dial assistance rendered by several gentle- 
men of known worth and patriotism ; foremost 
amongst them the late Daniel Devlin and Jud^e S 
Charles P. Daly. To their earnest co-opera- 
tion the Brigade was largely indebted, in con- 
junction with the indefatigable labors of Gen. 
Meagher, for the efficient services it was enabled 
to render in the field. 





CHAPTER YI. 



THE GEXEKAL AT THE HEAD OP HIS BRIGADE — - 
APPOINTMENT BY PRESIDENT LINCOLN, AND CON- 
FIRMATION BY THE SENATE THE FIRST BATTLE. 



On the 18th of November, 1861, Meagher left 
for Washington with the first regiment of the 
Brigade. The others soon followed. A splen- 
did set of colors were presented to each regi- 
ment at the residence of Archbishop Hughes, 
on Madison Avenue, prior to their departure. 
Meagher in his most eloquent style made an- 
swer for his command that the men would do 
their duty faithfully. He made no hasty pledges. 

The colors received on that day, with the 
motto " No Retreat," were returned unsullied, 
though torn and battle-stained. The motto in- 
scribed upon them received a magnificent veri- 
fication ; for, in the fiercest conflicts, and through 



126 THOMAS FEANCIS MEAGHER. 

all peril and suffering, the men wlio fought un- 
der them never turned their backs upon the en- 
em}'. Even throughout the harassing campaign 
of the Peninsula thej formed the rear-guard of 
the Army of the Potomac, protecting it from 
the repeated assaults of the foe. To them at 
least each day brought victor}^, but "no re- 
treat!" 

It is not out of place to state that General 
Meagher did not raise the Irish Brigade with 
the view to command it. All along he wished, 
and, so far as he was concerned, intended that 
General Shields should take command. Meagh- 
er was not only willing but determined to occu- 
py no other position than that of Aide on Gen- 
eral Shield's staff. Shields was at this time in 
California. He was written to to come on to 
Washington. But he had left California for 
Mexico, and the Brigade was ready to take the 
field without his having been heard from. Un- 
der these circumstances, Meagher yielded to 
the earnest solicitations of the officers of the 
Brigade, and consented to accept the command 
of it, should the Brigadier-General's rank be 
conferred upon him by the President, as it sub- 
sequently was on the 3d of February, and con- 
firmed b}^ the Senate during the same month. 



LETTER OF CONGRATULATION. Va! 

Proud of his military success, at tins moment, 
and enjoying exuberant anticipations of the 
career before him, he wrote the following letter 
to the author : — 

" Headquarters Irish Brigade, i 
" Sumner's Division, Camp California, ) 

"Feb. 21, 1862. 

" My Dear Lyons : 

" Of all the congratulatory letters which I 
have received since my confirmation by the Sen- 
ate, not one was more welcome than yours. 
Coming from a true friend of mine, and an earn- 
est friend of Ireland, I accept cordially your 
happy salutations for myself and my Irish Bri- 
gade. Our actions in the future will not, I feel 
confident, disappoint the brightest expectations 
of our friencls, of whom we count you one of 
the worthiest and most estimable. 

" Yery sincerely, your friend, 
" Thomas Francis Meagher, 

" Brigadier-General U. S. V. 
" Commanding the Irish Brigade, 
" Army of the Potomac." 

To follow the fortunes of the Irish Brigade is 
no part of my task, except in so far as the sub- 
ject of this biography, in his character as a sol- 



128 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHEK. 

dier, becomes individually conspicuous in the 
many varied chapters wliicli comprise its histo- 
ry. Meagher was, of course, the living presence 
of the Brigade all through its career, from its 
first encampment in the brushwood at Camp 
California, to the fatal battle of Cliancellors- 
ville, where, like a dissolving vision, it melted 
away into the shadow of death. The Brigade, 
upon its arrival in Yirginia, was soon ordered, 
with its division, to Warrenton Junction. This 
movement afforded Meagher an acceptable op- 
portunity for indulging in a description, in his 
peculiar, light-hearted, graphic manner, full of 
humor, but not by any means devoid of pathos. 
"When we arrived at Warrenton Junction," 
says Meagher, " orders were given to encamp, 
and in five minutes the orders were carried out. 
All we had to do was to stack arms, and throw 
ourselves down in the mud. Let me tell you 
what kind of a camp we had. There were no 
tents, and this spared us the trouble to pitch 
them. Our camping-ground was in a deep 
wood of very tall, dark, bare pines. The sharp 
winds of the winter had stripped them of their 
leaves, and shivering and groaning in their na- 
kedness, they stood up there like the frozen 
skeletons of so many Noah Clay poles that had 



IN CAMP. 129 

been shaved, and whipped, and starved to death. 
All day, through their wid^ open net-work of 
leafless branches, you saw the watery clouds 
sweep by in the leaden sky. All night, through 
the same sort of gridiron overhead, you saw the 
pale stars trembling in the darkness ; and now 
and then you caught a glimpse of the sickly 
moon, as she thrust her face through her cur- 
tains, and then, as if disgusted with the pros- 
pect, suddenly drew it back again. The red and 
yellow leaves lay thick upon the ground. Were 
it dry underneath, they would have made a de- 
lightful bed. As it was, they not only covered, 
but were saturated with, the mutl which wel- 
comed us, not to our gory beds, but to rheu- 
matic sheets. It was five inches only better 
than a confirmed swamp we were ordered to 
encamp in. There was little or no grumbling 
about it, however. Indeed, it gave rise to more 
jokes than moans. Picking your way through 
the poor fellows as they lay there on the broad 
of their backs in their blankets, with their toes 
to the sky and their knapsacks and coffee-ket- 
tles under their heads, jou'd hear one of them 
say— 

" ' Sure, Peter, we might as well be in a bog.' 

" And then another — 
6* 



130 THOMAS FEANCIS MEAGHEE. 

" ' Oh, then, begorra, they migjit as well have 
drowned us at once.' 

*' Whilst a third would ejaculate — 

" ' Well, one consolation, we'll all be in the 
hospital to-morrow, and anyhow that's a thrifle 
better than this.' 

" The officers were just as pleasantly situated 
as the men — though some of them contrived to 
improve on the mud and the leaves. One of 
them knocked a cracker-box asunder, and lay- 
ing the nice smooth even-edged pieces together, 
so as to form a stretcher, had something else 
than his blanket and braided blue overcoat be- 
tween him and the morass. Another of them — 
a gentleman of the most ingenious turn of mind 
and wonderful research — quietly slipped the 
cushions out of an ambulance, to the dismay 
of a most benevolent surgeon who came a little 
too late to look them up for himself. 

" General French had his head in a hen-coop. 
General Bichardson had his between the pro- 
truding roots, well up against the shelving 
trunk, of a very big tree. As for my headquar- 
ters — nothing under the circumstances could 
have been finer. Half a dozen pioneers from 
one of the regiments cut a couple dozen of 
strong tough stakes, eight or ten feet long, and 



IN CAMP. 131 

planting them firmly in the bog in the form of 
a circle, the diameter of which was fully twelve 
feet, interlaced them closely and tightly with a 
quantity of branches or twigs, which, when the 
enclosure was complete, gave the structure the 
appearance of a kish or basket of noble dimen- 
sions. Being tasteful as well as useful, however, 
the pioneers were not content to leave the walls 
of the stockade in all the cold simplicity of 
wicker-work. So they hunted about the wood, 
and finding a lot of dark-green bushes of some 
kind or other, interweaved them with the wicker- 
work, and thus gave the edifice a warm and 
summer-like appearance. Although they were 
Irishmen, the architects didn't forget to leave a 
door-way. It was a beautiful door-way — arched 
and ample — the arch being decorated with a 
sheep's skull and h'orns — a relic of the more 
peaceful and plenteous times of old Virginia. Yet 
the most important part was now to be done. 
The flooring had to be laid. One can't hang 
himself up as he does his coat on a wall, and go 
to sleep in a dry quilt, however warm and sum- 
mer-like the wall may be. 'T would be infinite- 
ly better to pull the wall down and fall to sleep 
on it flat, than have it standing up there wall- 
ing in mud. A little way off from the camp 



132 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

was a barn, and in this barn was a short ladder 
and a loose door — that is, a door that wasn't on 
hinges and looked as though it was going astray. 
The poor pioneers thought it no harm to borrow 
the ladder and door, without letting any one 
know of it. So what with the short ladder, the 
loose door, and three bags of oats, the sleeping 
arrangements of the headquarters of the Irish 
Brigade were- as dry as a rock. Fortunately 
they were on such a scale as to enable the lessee 
to accommodate over a dozen. It would have 
done the heart of the Sanitary Commission 
good to have seen that dozen and over laid out 
for the night, and answering in their deep slum- 
bers the music of the mules, and any astronom- 
ical observations they might choose to make. 
There they lay without slats or stitch between 
them — on the ladder, on the door, on the bags of 
oats — ranged all round the beautiful rotunda — 
forming a vocal surbase to it — with their sad- 
dle-bags serving as bolsters, and a crackling, 
red-hot, huge, kitchen-like fire shooting up its 
sparks and sending forth its incense in the cen- 
tre of the temple. The temple was the admira- 
tion, the wonder, the envy of surrounding quar- 
ters. General Richardson thought it altogether 
too good for the times. General French, burn- 



FIRST BATTLE. 133 

ing with poetic ecstasy, declared it was a Dru- 
id's grove. One of the regimental commissa- 
ries said it was just the place for his hard-tack 
and vinegar ; whilst a demure hospital-steward, 
putting in his head and sweeping the circle with 
his spectacles, exclaimed — ' Oh ! what a nice 
place that would be for my plasters and bot- 
tles !' " 

The first battle in which the Irish Brigade 
was engaged was at Fair Oaks, fought on June 
1st, 1862. The battle of Seven Pines had been 
raging, close by, all the previous day, and here 
Meagher's best effort as a military historian 
was displayed. The Brigade, then stationed 
half a day's march from the battle-field, was 
indulging in steeple-chases, and other camp 
jovialities in true Irish fashion, while Gen. 
Casey was fighting the confederate forces un- 
der Longstreet, Hill, Huger, and Smith, on the 
"Williamsburg road. Next morning the fight 
was renewed at Fair Oaks, and the part played 
by his command is thus described by Gen. 
Meagher. Alluding to the festivities in camp, 
the General writes — 

** In the midst of the preparations for this per- 



134 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

formance, the order came for tlie Brigade to 
fall in. In half an hour the Brigade was on 
the march. It was a cold and gloomy after- 
noon. The tremendous rain of the previous 
night had flooded the low grounds on both 
sides of the Chickahominy, whilst it had swol- 
len the river to such a volume that only one 
bridge was found available for the passage of 
the troops. French's brigade, which marched 
on a line parallel to ours, was compelled to 
wade, up to the middle, through the wide- 
spread waters, and the deep mud over which 
they swept. After a little it was found impos- 
sible to bring the artillery along. 

" Close on twelve o'clock, the head of the 
column reached the field where Sedgwick's 
Division, rapidly coming up an hour or so be- 
fore sundown, had met and checked the enemy. 
The night was the blackest night ever known. 
Not a star was visible. One vast cloud filled 
the sky, producing so dense a darkness you 
would have thought it was through a coal-pit, 
in the bowels of the earth, that we were march- 
ing. Here and there, however, you could catch 
the yellow glimmering — or at times the broad 
and sudden flashes — of the lanterns of the sur- 
geons, as they groped and stumbled over the 



SCENES ON THE BATTLE-FIELD. 135 

field in search of the wounded. The saddest 
moans were heard on every side. A dull; heavy, 
woful murmur deepened the tramp of the regi- 
ments passing on through the darkness, over 
the slain and dying. Now and then, a shot 
from the pickets struck the ear ; and this was 
sometimes quickly followed by a burst of mus- 
ketry in the woods to the right and front. Had 
the sky been clear — had the stars and moon 
been glistening over it — the scene, perhaps, 
might have been dismaying. As it was, the 
horrors of the battle-field were buried in the 
depths of that impenetrable night, and the 
wearied men of the Brigade lay down to rest, 
upon the drenched and torn ground, in the 
midst of the havoc of the day, hardly conscious 
of the ghastly companions who slept among 
them, bathed in blood. 

" But the dawn revealed it all. Here was a 
Georgian — a tall, stout-limbed, broad-shoul- 
dered fellow — lying on his face ; his head half- 
buried in the mud ; his long thick bro^vn hair 
soaked and matted with the rain and mire ; his 
long white fingers grasping a broken musket ; 
his canteen and drab felt-hat flung a few feet 
from him ; his haversack, with two or three 
biscuits breaking through it, tossed over his 



136 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

back ; and a course hempen shirt, all clotted 
and starched with blood, sticking out from un- 
der his empty cartridge-box and gray jacket. 
Not far from him was a dead horse ; his dis- 
tended eyeballs glaring in the pale light ; and 
a thick crust of blood and foam edging the open 
mouth that had grown stiff in the last vvri things 
of the poor brute's agony. Nearer to us, close 
to a burned stump, lay one of our own artillery- 
men ; his bold handsome face black with sweat 
and the smoke of battle ; his right leg torn off 
by a shell above the knee ; his black hair flat- 
tened back and streaming from his forehead, as 
though he had been shipwrecked and washed 
ashore ; his brass-hilted short sword bent under 
him ; and as he lay there upturned, cold and 
rigid as though he were made of stone, he 
seemed to be gazing, with the wild, fixed look 
of an idiot, at the clouds floating through the 
watery sky. 

" The root of a withered and whitened oak 
was the Headquarters of the Irish Brigade 
this morning. Behind this root was a pile of 
muskets ; some with bayonets fixed ; others 
without lock or bayonet ; many of them bent 
and twisted ; two or three of them coiled into 
hoops, as though thej- were pliable as leaden 



FAIK OAKS. 137 

water-pipes ; all more or less befouled and dam- 
aged. Blankets, too, were strewn everywhere 
around. Knapsacks — some of them torn open — 
others as tidily packed as they would be on an 
inspection — lay all about. Further down the 
field, within a few hundred paces of the rail- 
road, a gun-carriage was upset, and had the 
muzzle of its rifled piece sunk into a patch of 
black swamp, thickly set with short green grass. 
To the rear of the Headquarters — a musket- 
shot from it — was an ambulance with one wheel 
only, and a blood-smeared stretcher slipping 
out of it behind, underneath the tarpaulin cur- 
tain. 

" I was quietly and mournfully noticing these 
and a hundred other evidences of the battle of 
the previous day — was, by the by, talking to 
a young Irishman from South Carolina, whom 
I found propped up against a mouldy old tree, 
disabled by^ musket-shot in the side, and man- 
fully suppressing the expression of his pain- 
when there broke from the lofty deep woods in 
our front a deafening volley. Again and again 
was it repeated. Then there was a like volley 
from the woods on our right — then from the 
woods on the left— and then a volley from the 
entire front, sharp and crackling as a thunder- 



138 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

crash in the sudden outburst of a thunder- 
storm, but far more prolonged. 

" Waking up from the profound silence and 
darkness of the night, to their utter astonish- 
ment the enemy found us within pistol-range of 
them ; nor were we less astonished at finding 
them, without any intimation or warning what- 
ever, so close at hand. 

" The Pamunkey and Richmond railroad ran 
within five hundred paces of the Brigade line, 
and almost parallel to it. Two miles to our 
rear was the Chickahominy. Richardson's di- 
vision, of which mine was the 2d Brigade, oc- 
cupied in two lines a wide cornfield, the crop 
on which had been thoroughly trampled out of 
sight, nothing in the way of vegetation remain- 
ing above the soaked and trodden surface but. 
the blackened stumps of the pines that former- 
1}^ covered it. To the right were tall, beautiful, 
noble woods : to the extreme leik the same. 
Between the left of our line and the railroad 
was a smaller wood. On the other side of the 
railroad w^as a long thick belt of handspme 
trees — robust, straight, towering trees— full of 
glittering and rusthng leaves — the beams of the 
dawning sun veiling them with transparent gold 
— not a breath of wind wakening them from 



FAIR OAKS. ' 139 

their grand repose. This superb belt, however, 
concealed an ugly swamp, and the perplexing 
and almost impervious undergrowth with which 
it w^as inter\\'oven. Richmond was but four 
miles distant from the colors of the Sixty-Ninth 
New York Volunteers, the right of the Brigade. 
One of the pioneers of the regiment — formerly 
a sailor. — an immense, shaggy, iron-built fellow, 
with a tanned skin and a tempestuous eye, agile 
and daring as a tiger — darting up a towering 
pine close to the railroad, saw the dome of the 
Capitol flashing through the smoke of the city, 
the church-spires, and shining fragments of the 
bridges over the James river. 

" The object of the enemy was to drive us 
from the railroad, back to the Chickahominy, 
and into it if possible. They had surprised 
General Casey the day before, on the other side 
of the railroad, and had nearly cut his Division 
to pieces, ^edgwick, however, coming up rap- 
idly on the right, and Kearney on the left, the 
enemy were promptly checked, and fell back for 
the night. At daybreak he resumed the attack. 

" A few minutes after the volley I have men- 
tioned, Howard's Brigade had crossed the rail- 
road and were blazing away at a Brigade of 
Georgians in that magnificent forest in front of 



140 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

US, forcing and tearing their way through the 
under-brash, through the swamp, over fallen 
trees and mangled bodies, in the full blaze of a 
blinding fire. French's Brigade followed. Our 
turn came next. 

" The Sixty-Ninth swept down to the railroad, 
and reaching it, deployed into line of battle on 
the track. This they did under a hurricane of 
bullets. Once in line, however, they paid back 
the compliments of the morning with the char- 
acteristic alacrity and heartiness of a genuine 
Irish acknowledgment. The exchange of fer- 
vent salutations was kept up for an hour. The 
chivalry of Virginia met its match in the chival- 
ry of Tipperary. 

" In the mean time, the Eighty-Eighth New 
York, piercing the small wood which, as I have 
said, lay between the railroad and the left of 
the Brigade, debouched from it into a pretty 
deep catting of the road, in which the regiment 
threw itself into line of battle, as tlie Sixty- 
Ninth had done a little higher up, and got to 
work with a dazzling celerity. In front of the 
cutting was an open space, some' ten or twelve 
acres in extent, forming a half-circle. A rail- 
fence ran across it, a hundred paces from the 
railroad. Here and there, behind the fence, 



FAIR OAKS. Ml 

were clumps of shrubbery and wild blackberry 
bushes. The whole was gh't by a cincture of 
dark pines, closely set together, in the limbs of 
which, hidden by the leaves and shadows of the 
trees, were swarms of sharp-shooters ; whilst 
the wood itself, and the clumps and bushes, 
were alive with Kebels. Climbing the embank- 
ment of the cutting, so as to enable them to 
rest their muskets and plant their colors on top 
of it, the Eighty -Eighth threw their first fire in 
one broad sheet of lightning into the fence and 
wood. From both fence and wood came, an in- 
stant after, a scorching whirlwind, tearing and 
ploughing up the grass and cornstalks in the 
open space, and ripping the colors, as it made 
them flap and beat against the flag-staffs. 

" Close to where the colors were planted 
stood a log-built cottage — the property of a 
lethargic German with pink eyes and yellow 
hair — and two or three auxiliary structures de- 
voted to pigs, chickens, and bees. These served 
as an excellent cover for a company of the 
Eighty-Eighth, detailed for special practice 
against the shar23-shooters. 

" On the opposite embankment there stood a 
very dingy and battered little barn, abounding 
in fleas and mice, and superabundantly carpet- 



142 THO]Mx\.S FRANCIS MEAGHEB. 

ted with damp liay. This was appropriated as 
the hospital of the regiment. The red flag was 
displa^^ed from the roof, and in a few minutes it 
was the scene of much suffering, tenderness, de- 
votion, thought and love of home, heroic resig- 
nation, and calm bravery under the inexorable 
hand of death. There, indeed, were to be seen 
in many instances the sweetness, the cheerful- 
ness, the strength, the grandeur of character 
which proved the fidelity of the private soldier 
to his cause, the disinterestedness with which 
he had pledged himself to it, the consciousness 
of his having done w^ell in the face of danger, 
and leaving to his home and comrades a mem- 
ory which would brighten the sadness of those 
who knew, loved, and honored him. There was 
to be seen the good, kind, gentle priest of the 
old and eternal Faith, calming the fevered brain 
with words which at such moments express the 
divinest melody, and gladdening the drooping 
eye with visions that transform the bed of tor- 
ture into one of flowers, and the cloud of death 
into a home of splendor. 

" Driven back on the right b}^ Sedgwick — on 
the centre by Eichardson — on the left by Kear- 
ney — baffled, broken, routed at all three points 
at the one and the same time — at noon that day 



FAIR OAKS. 143 

the Rebel forces were pursued by Hooker. Had 
he been permitted, he would have followed them 
into Richmond. Kearney was mad for the pur- 
suit — so was Sumner — so w-ere f'rench and 
Sedgwick — so was every one of our officers and 
soldiers. It was the instinct and passion of the 
entire army. 

" ' Now that we've got them on the run' — as a 
Sergeant of the Eighty-Eighth knowingly ob- 
served — ' the thing is to keep them running.' 

" It would have been the telling game to play. 
Followed up briskly and with the determination 
to win, the enemy would not have faced about 
this side of Richmond. As it was, his retreat 
could hardly have been more fearfully disor- 
dered. Thousands of muskets were flung aw^ay 
— cartridge-boxes, blankets, everything that 
ever so slightly^ checked or slackened the rapid- 
ity of that wild flight — for it was nothing short 
of that — were torn off, dropped on the road, or 
whirled impatiently into the woods. General 
Joe Johnston, who commanded the Rebel forces, 
had been previously wounded, but the fact was 
concealed from his men. But the impression 
that he was still at their head had no effect. 
The fragments of his army hurled themselves, 
through the choking dust and blistering sun of 



144 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHEK. 

that tumultuous hour, into the streets of the 
Confederate capital ; and it \yas not until they 
were well assured that the Federals had stacked 
arms, instead of keeping the bayonet to their 
heels, that they drew breath and bridle, and 
came to their wits' again. All this I have had 
from a gentleman — a South Carolinian by birth — 
who was in Eichmond at the time ; and witness- 
ing the thorough disorder and dismay of the 
Bebel forces, was utterly astonished at not find- 
ing the Federal columns in hot pursuit. 

" Followed up with impetuosity that day, the 
Army of Northern Virginia would have received 
a staggering blow, the city of Richmond was 
ours. General McClellan would have inaugurated 
a reign of victory with an achievement of in- 
comparable advantage. Never shall I forget 
the fierceness with which General Kearney used 
to condemn and curse this blunder — never forget 
how that quick, stormy, imperious eye of his 
used to flash its lightnings, then cloud up and 
darken, and then flash out again with a more 
scathing fire — never forget how that proud 
frame of his used to swell with vehement vexa- 
tion, with a furious impatience, with a savage 
resentment almost — as he spoke of the oppor- 
tunity that was so heedlessly and blindly lost, 



FAIR OAKS. 14:5 

and cast to the idle winds that day. A splendid 
soldier, full of animation, full of electricity^, full 
of daring, he could not brook the caution which 
satisfied itself with half a victory, and inflamed 
with faith in the power of enthusiasm and rapid 
action, chafed and beat the air with anger Avhen 
a tamer policy prevailed. 

" As it was, however, the result of the battle 
of Fair Oaks enabled General McClellan to es- 
tablish the left wing of his army behind in- 
trenched works within four miles of Richmond. 
The right wing, under General Fitz-John Poi% 
ter, extended the other side of the Chickahomi- 
ny. Had General McDowell effected a junction 
with Porter, the Federal lines would have 
proved impenetrable, and the capture of Rich- 
mond would have inevitably closed the cam- 
paign of the Peninsula. 

" The three weeks we spent behind those 
intrenched works, were busy weeks. In the 
woods, fronting and flanking us on the right, 
the pickets were unremittingly engaged. At 
tattoo and reveilU the enemy's drums were punc- 
tually heard, beating as loudlj^ and spiritedly as 
our own. There were frequent alarms. During 
the night, the crackling of firearms was inces- 
sant. At times — generally in the afternoon — a 



146 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

sudden dash of the enemy in considerable force, 
would throw our pickets back upon their re- 
serves, and the reserves back upon the breast- 
works into the hideous dbattis in front of them — 
a distorted mass and monstrous net-work of 
tangled trees that had been levelled and flung 
into the most bothering confusion by the west- 
ern axe-men of Richardson's Division. 

" One way or other, there was excitement 
enough to counteract in a great measure the 
vitiated atmosphere and water of the vile 
swamp in which we lay intrenched. The camp 
itself, in those calm beautiful days of June, was 
ever and always a brilliant picture — full of life 
— abounding in a variety of incidents, points of 
interest, and all the striking coloring and group- 
ing of a military drama on the largest scale. 

" There, on every side and close to us, were 
those fatal woods, which seemed to follow us 
wherever we went, and hem us in wherever we 
pitched our tents. Here were the breastworks 
— in some places built of huge logs — for the 
most part of red earth — stretching in zigzag 
lines, from the railroad over towards the river, 
with a deep ditch outside them. Between the 
breast-works and the woods, the abattis, just 
mentioned, covered the intervening ground with 



FAIR' OAKS. 147 

a wreck of splintered trunks and broken limbs, 
and a torturing web and trap of stumps and 
branches, as impervious and inextricable as an 
Indian jungle. Here again, at salient angles of 
those zigzag lines, were batteries of brass Na- 
poleons and brown Parrots in position, with 
their ammunition stored in bomb-proof maga- 
zines, and the artillerymen grouped about them. 
"Within the lines, and all over a vast area, were 
the long white streets of the camp, glistening in 
the blue sunshine. Close to an interval of log- 
built -breast-work were the tents of the Sixty- 
Ninth Pennsylvania — a stubborn Irish regiment, 
with its heart as big as its muscle — proud as a 
true chief of some old Celtic clan could be of 
the Green Flag it carried, and sworn that foe, 
as well as friend, should have to speak of it as 
the symbol of a gallant race and do it honor. 
Next to them was a solid German regiment, the 
Seventh New York, with the gorgeous tri-color 
of the Rhine flying at the Colonel's quarters — 
the band filling the dreamy air with the liveliest 
eloquence of war — the soldiers themselves filling 
it wdth the pungent incense of their brier- wood 
pipes and meerschaums, or with the savory fumes 
which curled upwards from the bubbling fry- 
ing-pan and kettle, sweetening the miasma of 



148 THOMAS FEANeiS MEAGHER. 

the swamp with the fragrance of pork and 
onions. As one glanced at the colors displayed 
at the headquarters of the different regiments, 
and recognized in their splendid blazonry the 
mottoes and insignia of the several States they 
represented, as w^ell as the mottoes and insignia 
of the various nationalities that diversified the 
character of the national army, he could not 
but call to mind the noble lines in which John 
Savage describes the glorious uprising of the 
North in vindication of the national authority." 

So much for Meagher's powers as a military 
historian, but the opinion which he states as 
having been shared equally with himself, by 
General Kearney, and others, that a rapid pur- 
suit of the Confederates into Bichmond, after 
the battle of Fair Oaks, could have been suc- 
cessfully and easily accomplished, was n^t en- 
tertained by General McClellan ; for lie sa,js, in 
his report, after describing the swollen condi- 
tion of the river, and the destruction of the 
bridges — " The only available means therefore 
of uniting our forces at Fair Oaks, for an ad- 
vance on Richmond soon after the battle, was to 
march the troops from Mechanicsville and 
other points on the left banks of the Chicka- 



FAIR OAKS. 149 

liominy down to Bottom's Bridge, and thence 
over the Williamsburg road to the position near 
Fair Oaks, a distance of about 23 miles. In the 
condition of the roads at that time this march 
could not have been made with artillery in less 
than two days, by which time the enemy would 
have been secure within his intrenchments 
around Richmond. In short, the idea of unit- 
ing the two wings of the army in time to make 
a vigorous pursuit of the enemy with the pros- 
pect of overtaking him before he reached Eich- 
mond, only five miles distant from the field of 
battle, is simply absurd, and was, I presume, 
never seriously entertained by any one connect- 
ed with the Army of the Potomac. An ad- 
vance, involving the separation of the two wings 
by the impassable Chickahomiuy, would have 
exposed each to defeat in detail. Therefore I 
held the position already gained, and completed 
our crossings as rapidly as possible." 

After the battle of Fair Oaks, Gen. Meagher 
had the gratification to receive the compliments 
of General McClellan, and of the now famous 
Spanish leader. General Prim, upon the valor of 
his troops. It is told that when riding up the 
railroad with General Heitzelman, General Prim 
passed by the Sixty-Third and Eighty-Eighth 



150 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHEE. 

regiments drawn up in line. General Meagher, 
with some of the members of his staff, were in 
front of the regiments. Struck with the stal- 
wart and muscular appearance of the men, as 
well as with their military bearing, the old Cas- 
tilian inquired through his aid-de-camp inter- 
preter, " What troops are these ?" The General 
replied, " A portion of the Irish Brigade." The 
Marshal's eye brightened, his olive complexion 
could not hide the pride of the soldier at sight 
of such fighting-material. In a dignified man- 
ner, characteristic of his race and nation, he 
complimented the Brigade and its commander, 
who replied that " Spain had reason to appre- 
ciate Irish valor ; that Spain and Ireland were 
old friends from ancient times, and their sol- 
diers had often stood side by side together on 
many a hard-fought field." The generals, ac- 
companied by their brilliant staffs and escort of 
cavalry, galloped off amid the thundering cheers 
of the Eighty -Eighth. In a conversation at the 
Headquarters of the Army, after visiting the 
troops, General Prim said — " I don't wonder 
that the Irish fight so well : their cheers are as 
good as the bullets of other men." General 
McClellan, accompanied by his staff, visited the 
Corps of General Sumner. On coming to the 



BATTLE OF MECHANICSVILLE. 151 

Brigade, he was met bj General Meagher and 
staff at the right of the line. On reaching the 
left, after using the most complimentary terms 
in reference to the men, he especially charged 
General Meagher to return, and thank the regi- 
ments for their gallant and steady conduct in 
the action of the 1st of June at Fair Oaks. The 
General conveyed the message to the Brigade, 
adding that General McClellan also desired him 
to say that when he called upon them again, 
Avhich he would do in case of need, he had the 
fullest confidence that they would emulate the 
brave efforts of that day. The trust thus so 
confidingly reposed in the men of the Irish 
Brigade was never violated. The approbation 
vfhich they won from the Commander-in-chief 
in the first battle-field in which they " fleshed 
their maiden swords," was also gallantly earned 
in all the desperate conflicts which succeeded it. 

The trying hours for Meagher and his Brigade 
approached when the famous retreat of tlie 
Army of the Potomac from the Peninsula was 
decided upon ; for, as will be noticed, they had 
to bear much of the fighting from "White 
House to Malvern Hill, in the battles whereof 
I have now to speak; 

The Battle of Mechanicsville had been fought 



152 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

on Thursday, the 26th of June, between 60,000 
Confederate troops, under General R. E. Lee, 
supported by Generals Stonewall Jackson, Long- 
street, A. P. Hill, and Gustavus W. Smith, and 
a force of 35,000 men of the national army un- 
der Fitz-John Porter and General McCall, who 
held positions at Beaver Dam and Mechanics- 
ville. The conflict began in the afternoon and 
only ended at nine at night, leaving the Confed- 
erate troops in position. Both sides were ex- 
hausted and slept that night upon their arms. 
This was the first of the celebrated Seven days' 
battles. After this, commenced the retreat from 
"White House on the Pamunkey, at that time 
the base of General McClellan's army, to Har- 
rison's Landing on the James River. In this 
well-conducted movement, — which will ever re- 
dound to' the credit of all wlio shared in the 
heroism, the patience, and the sufferings of the 
retreating army, — the Irish Brigade participa- 
ted from first to last. 

The abandonment of White House, and the 
destruction of all the stores that could not be 
removed, immediately took place. Gen. Stone- 
man with his cavalry and flying artillery, which 
had just been called from his position, at Han- 
over Court House, when the retreat was deter- 



GAINES' MILL. 153 

mined on, was ordered to burn all the depots of 
stores between the Pamunkej and the Chicka- 
hominy, which he executed with great vigor, 
much to the chagrin of the enemy. Colonel In- 
galls, the quartermaster, sent nearly all the 
stores to Savage's Station. On Friday morning, 
the 27th, General McCall fell back on the 
bridges crossing the Chickahominy, where he 
was ordered to make a stand against the ap- 
proaching enemy, while the main body of the 
army was commencing the retreat. The force 
consisted of 30,000 troops, under Generals Fitz- 
John Porter, Morrell, Sykes, Martindale, But- 
terfield, and Griffin. The artillery consisted of 
sixty pieces of cannon, which were posted on 
the heights surrounding the position which oc- 
cupied a line of battle extending two miles from 
the Chickahominy to Coal Harbor, Fitz-John 
Porter commanding the whole force. General 
Reynolds, with his reserves, held the right ; at 
Coal Harbor and in the rear were the troops of 
General Seymour and General Cook. In the 
neighborhood of the fight stood Gaines' Mill, 
from which this bloody and desperate engage- 
ment took the name it has since borne. In this 
position, from early morning until near noon, 
the national forces awaited the shock of battle, 



154 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

resisting, at the same time, the skirmishes of 
the advancing enemy, who were moving in three 
cohimns with an aggregate force of nearly 
80,000. The first column marched on the line 
of the Chickahominy ; another a short distance 
inland, and the third advanced straight on our 
right at Coal Harbor. 

A little before 12 o'clock the conflict opened 
with the thunder of a hundred and twenty can- 
non on both sides, shaking the earth for miles 
around. It was not long before the whole scene 
of action was enveloped in smoke, and under 
the mantle which shut out the light of a bright 
summer day commenced the deadly struggle of 
the contending hosts. Charge followed, charge 
on the part of the Confederates, desperate and 
almost reckless in their fur}', but they were met 
by our troops with a stubborn front and repulsed 
one after the other, with immense destruction 
to the assail 'ints. Large masses of men swayed 
to and fro over the undulating ground, like the 
surges of the sea illuminated by lightning ; 
gleaming bayonets and flashes of musketry 
being visible through the dense cloud that over- 
hung the scene. Now the cavalry come into 
play ; for 20,000 Southern reserves come fresh 
into action upon our flank, and our infantry are 



GAINES' MILL. 155 

getting exhausted, and what is worse, they are 
running out of ammunition. The contest of 
three to one is too much for them, with the 
artillery matched nearly gun for gun. The 
order for the Fifth regular cavalry to charge is 
at length given. The French Prince de Joiu- 
ville, and the Due de Chartres, and Comte de 
Paris, were near the spot, and the former de- 
scribes the charge as a glorious sight, and a 
terrible slaughter. It absolutely failed to re- 
trieve the ground the troops were evidently 
losing fast. Every reserve we had was by this 
time thrown into the field, while fresh troops of 
the enemy came pouring in. Our lines were 
wavering at different points, though they were 
not yet broken. The round-shot and shell from 
the batteries were tearing up the ground, so 
that the contestants were carrying on the san- 
guinary conflict in an atmosphere of dust and 
smoke, through which the confusion seemed 
greater. At this juncture it became evident 
that General Porter must be re-enforced, or his 
little army of protection must fall before the 
superior numbers of the foe. Accordingly, 
General McClellan ordered General Sumner, 
whose corps was at Fair Oaks, to send up two 
brigades to support Porter. Sumner selected 



156 THOMAS FKANCIS MEAGHER. 

the brigades of French and Meagher. They 
started at double quick, making short time of 
the five miles that lay between them and the 
battle-field. The order was given at five o'clock 
in the afternoon. They reached the scene of 
action soon after to find General Porter's troops 
retiring stubbornly, though considerably broken 
and disordered. General French being the 
senior officer, commanded the two brigades. 
Meagher led the Irish Brigade. Forcing their 
way through the retreating masses of Porter's 
command, they gained the crest of a hill, formed 
into line, and with one wild shout, swept down 
upon the enemy, then flushed with victory. 
Through a storm of shot and bullets they went 
— on, on, to the very faces of the foe. The 
shock was almost instantaneous. The enemy 
made a momentary stand. They were wholly 
unprepared for the impetuosity of the Irish 
troops, and after a fierce struggle, the whole 
force fell back, both infantry and artillery. The 
retreating forces of General Porter began to 
fall in in the rear of the victorious re-enforce- 
ments, and Meagher's Brigade stood, pant- 
ing and elated, between the army they had 
saved and the enemy they had vanquished. 
It was Fontenoy repeated ! 



GAINES' MILL. 157 

The whole descri]3tion of the battle reminds 
one of the lines of Southey : — 

" Then more fierce 
The conflict grew ; the din of arms — the yell 
Of savage rage — the shriek of agony — 
The groan of death, commingled in one sound 
Of undistinguished horrors ; while the sun, 
Ketiring slow beneath the plain' s far verge, 
Shed o'er the quiet hills his fading light." 





CHAPTER YII. 

THE BRIGADE GOES INTO ACTION WITH ECLAT 

PERILS OF THE REAR-GUARD MEAGHER IN THB 

THICK OF THE FIGHT. 

When the safety of Fitz-John Porter's army- 
was secured, French's and Meagher's brigades 
were withdrawn, — just at the dawn of day, but 
not before the whole of Porter's army, includ- 
ing all the wounded, were transported across the 
Chickahominy. General Meagher with his staff 
were the last to cross the river. The retreat of 
the Army of the Potomac was now fairly com- 
menced. The Irish Brigade had rejoined Sum- 
ner's Corps. On the 29th Gleneral Sumner 
broke camp at Fair Oaks, and took up a position 
at Allen's farm, between Orchard and Savage's 
stations. The enemy here made a furious at- 
tack on the right of General Sedgwick's divi- 
sion, but were repulsed. They next fell on the 



PEACH ORCHAED. 159 

left of Kichardson's division, but were forced, 
after some hard fighting, to retire in some dis- 
order. Three times they attacked, and each 
time were re^Dulsed. This fight is known in the 
record of the Brigade as the Battle of Peach 
Orchard. Next day General Franklin commu- 
nicated to General Sumner that the enemy were 
advancing on Savage's Station, after crossing 
the Chickahominy upon the bridges which they 
had repaired. Sumner hurried up, and soon 
after noon formed a junction with Franklin, 
and, as senior officer, assumed command. The 
troops under Sumner and Franklin were drawn 
up in an open field to the left of the railroad, 
the right extending down the road and the left 
resting on the edge of the woods. Hancock's 
brigade was in the woods on the right and front, 
while the brigade of General Brooks held the 
woods to the left. General Burns was on the 
Williamsburg road, and it was here that the 
enemy made the first attack, at four o'clock in 
the afternoon of an intensely hot day. The 
fight soon became general along the line. Haz- 
zard's, Pettit's, Osborne's, and Bramhall's bat- 
teries were briskly engaged. Here the Irish 
Brigade especially distinguished itself. During 
the battle the Eighty -Eighth, then commanded 



160 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

by Major James Quinlan, made a splendid 
charge, which in a great measure turned the tide 
of battle. Major Quinlan dashingly led the 
charge in person, inflicting a stunning blow 
upon the enemy at a critical point in the action. 
General Richardson and General Burns com- 
plimented the Eighty-Eighth on their valor and 
efficient services on the field. The battle raged 
until between eight and nine o'clock at night, 
when, after an obstinate fight, the enemy were 
driven from the field. 

The battle of Savage's Station having thus 
terminated successfully for the national army, 
the retreat was continued across the White Oak 
Swamp, in the direction of Harrison's Landing, 
on the James River, which McClellan had se- 
lected as the new base. The retreat was not a 
leisurely affair. It was a vigorous campaign. 
Richardson's division, to which the Irish Bri- 
gade was attached, formed the rear-guard, and 
therefore had to meet the enemy— who was 
pressing on the flank of the army — in every 
attack. The rain was. falling in torrents when 
the Brigade commenced its march through the 
White Oak Swamp. By midnight, on the day 
of the battle at Savage's Station, the troops 
were on the road to White Oak Swamp bridge. 



WHITE OAK SWAMP. 161 

which was reached by daylight. The Brigade 
had been now five days in action : had during 
that time but little food and no rest. General 
McClellan states that the whole army was at 
this time exhausted. How then must it have 
fared with the rear-guard? Harassed by the 
foe by day and by night, hungry and weary, 
suffering from the scorching heat of the sun at 
noontide, and the heavy rains at night, the 
Brigade still went cheerily on, sustained by the 
presence of its commander, who shared every 
discomfort and braved every danger with his 
men ; sustained, too, by the consciousness of 
duty well performed, and not a little proud that, 
despite all the hard work and the fearful risks 
to which they were exposed, the post of honor 
and of danger was assigned to them. 

After the dreary night-march came the battle 
of White Oak Swamp, which opened vigorously 
about noon on the 30th by the enemy shelling 
the divisions of Generals Richardson and Smith, 
and Naglee's brigade, at the White Oak bridge. 
Generals Sumner, Heintzelman, McCall, Kear- 
ney, Franklin, Hooker, and Slocum were all 
engaged in this action. Richardson's division 
suffered severely. The principal attack was 
made by the enemy under Longstreet and Hill, 



162 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

nearly 20,000 strong, on McCall's division, who 
fought bravely for an hour, but were compelled 
to fall back ; but Generals Sumner and Hooker 
gallantly supported him. The enemy renewed 
their attack on Kearney's left, but were repulsed 
with heavy loss. About five o'clock in the af- 
ternoon, Meagher's Brigade was ordered to 
move up in quick time to Glendale, near Charles 
City cross-roads, at which point the enemy were 
pushing down in great force. As the Brigade 
advanced at a run, General Sumner, who with 
his staff was on the road, greeted them in pass- 
ing most cordially, saying — " Boys, you go in to 
save another day." The Brigade also received 
a lusty cheer from the splendid regiment of Lin- 
coln Cavalry, commanded by Colonel McEey- 
nolds, as the Irish troops swept past them, 
going into the field. The battle of Glendale 
was not finished until dark. It was but the 
continuation of the conflict at White Oak 
Swamp, and lasted without interruption for ten 
hours of that eventful day. The Federal loss 
was heavy, and Generals McCall, Burns, and 
Brooks were wounded. The line of battle ex- 
tended two miles and a half. The struggle at 
Glendale was the bloodiest conflict since the 
day at Fair Oaks, and was continued into the 



MALYEEN HILL. 163 

darkness of niglit, but it ended by the enemy 
being routed at all points and driven from the 
field. A writer, describing the battle of Glen- 
dale, says : — '' Meagher's Irish Brigade rendered 
itself very conspicuous by the gallantry with 
which it rushed, with cheers that made the wel- 
kin ring, upon the swarming Bebels." During 
the passage of the army through White Oak 
Swamp, which was at the same time a march 
and a series of battles, the sun of a fiercely hot 
June day beat down remorselessly upon the 
heads of the men, many of whom flung away 
coats and knapsacks, and not a few, who escaped 
the effects of shot and shell, fell sun-struck by 
the road-side. The dead and wounded were 
compelled to be left behind. Every available 
spot at Savage's Station was crowded with the 
sick and wounded, where they had to be aban- 
doned. 

On the first of July the last and most des- 
perate of the seven days' battles was fought at 
Malvern Hill. 

The conduct of Meagher's Brigade at the 
battle of Malvern Hill was superb. Three 
times it went into action, and each time won the 
applause of all who witnessed the gallant bear- 
ing of the men, and their General, who with his 



164 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

green plume dancing, and his sword flashing in 
front of the line, went conspicuously into the 
fight. On this occasion General Meagher had 
one of his narrowest escapes from death which, 
amid all the dangers and vicissitudes through 
which he passed, most miraculously spared 
him. A rifle-ball passed through the rim of 
his hat, within quarter of an inch of his right 
temple. Called up a third time during the bat- 
tle, the Brigade went in at the last moment, 
when the fortunes of the day were in the bal- 
ance, and saved the left wing of the army from 
being turned, at a period in the progress of the 
battle when such a disaster might have been 
irreparable. Their loss, as ma}^ be supposed, 
was very heavy, both in men and officers. Lieu- 
tenant Reynolds of the Sixty-Ninth fell dead, 
while Captain Leddy, and Captain O'Donovan, 
and Lieutenant Cahill were dangerously wound- 
ed. The horse of Major James Cavanagh of 
the Sixty-Ninth was shot dead, pierced by sev- 
eral balls. 

This was the last of the famous seven days' 
battles, in which Meagher showed his fine sol- 
dierly qualities. The Peninsula campaign was 
concluded. The Army of the Potomac had 
reached Harrison's Landing, and the next thing 



PtECRUITING. 165 

in order was a total change in the plan of attack 
upon Richmond, and a change of commanders, 
which, as events proved, resulted in disasters 
that were only retrieved by the restoration of 
General McClellan to the command and the su- 
perseding of General Pope. 

The Federal army having been ordered to 
withdraw from the Peninsula, General Meagher 
visited New York in order to obtain recruits to 
fill up his regiments. He was accompanied by 
the gallant Lieutenant Temple Emmet of his 
staff. He was warmly received in the city, but 
found considerable difficulty in obtaining re- 
cruits, as were also the efforts of General D. E. 
Sickles, who was engaged in a similar duty. 
Several new regiments were then being raised 
in the metropolis, and it was difficult to obtain 
men for those in the field. Other circumstances 
also militated against recruiting for the veteran 
regiments. Meagher made several stirring ap- 
peals to his countrj^men to join the standard of 
the republic. He made a magnificent address 
at the Armory of the Seventh Regiment New 
York National Guard. He was invited to the 
theatres, where he was received with the great- 
est enthusiasm. On these occasions he an- 
nounced that he accepted the invitations with 



166 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHEPw 

the hope of stimulating recruiting. His efforts, 
however, n^et with httle success. But while 
their General was in New York endeavoring to 
recruit their exhausted ranks, the Brigade, as 
usual, was busy. The enemy still held an an- 
noying position, on Malvern Hill, and frequent 
scouting parties were thrown out in that direc- 
tion, in many of which portions of the Brigade, 
the Sixty-Third and Eighty-Eighth in particular, 
played a conspicuous part. General Meagher 
returned to Harrison's Landing only to find the 
army on the eve of moving, and to direct the 
retrograde march of his command through 
"Williamsburg and Yorktown back to Fortress 
Monroe. 

After this came the famous battle of Antie- 
tam, in which Meagher's command played a 
glorious part. In the preceding actions, at 
Centreville and Manassas, the Brigade was not 
engaged. But in the battle of Antietam it fought 
gallantly, and made some terrible sacrifices. 

How the action at Antietam commenced with 
Richardson's division, of which Meagher's was 
the Second Brigade, General McClellan thus 
relates : — 

" General Richardson's division of the Second 



ANTIETAM. 167 

corps, pressing the rear-gaard of the enemy 
with vigor, passed Boonsboro' and Keedysville, 
and came upon the main body of the enemy, 
occupying in large force a strong position a few 
miles beyond the latter place. 

" It had been hoped to engage the enen.y 
during the 15th. Accordingly, instructions were 
given that if the enemy were overtaken ou the 
march they should be attacked at once ; if found 
in heavy force and in position, the corps in ad- 
vance should be placed in position for attack, 
and await my arrival. On reaching the ad- 
vanced position of our troops, I foand but two 
divisions, Richardson's and Sykes's, in position ; 
the other troops were halted in the road — the 
head of the column some distance in rear of 
Eichardson. 

" The enemy occupied a strong position on 
the heights, on the west side of Antietam creek, 
displaying a large force of infantry and cavalry, 
with numerous batteries of artillery, which 
opened on our columns as they appeared in 
sight on the Keedysville road and Sharpsburg 
turnpike, which fire was returned by Captain 
Tidball's light battery. Second United States 
artillery, and Pettit's battery, First New York 
artillery. 



168 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

" The division of General Kichardson, follow- 
ing close on the heels of the retreating foe, 
halted and deployed near Antietam river, on 
the right of the Sharpsburg road. General 
Sjkes, leading on the division of regulars on 
the old Sharpsburg road, came up and deployed 
to the left of General Eichardson, on the left of 
the road." 

This was on the 16th of September. During 
that afternoon and night Antietam creek was 
crossed at several points, but not without terri- 
ble fighting. At daylight the battle was fairly be- 
gan by General Hooker's corps, who drove the 
enemy from the open fields into the woods near 
the Hagerstown and Sharpsburg turnpike. The 
fighting soon spread over the whole line, and 
the action became general. For several hours 
the conflict raged. The loss of ofiicers was be- 
coming serious. General Mansfield fell mortal- 
ly wounded. Generals Hooker, Sedgwick, Dana, 
Crawford, and Hartsufi*, were also wounded. 
The enemy were being gradually forced back 
into the woods. While the hottest portion of 
the battle was on the right, General French was 
making a diversion to the left, by order of Gen- 
eral Sumner. In this direction the enemy was 



ANTIETAM. 169 

forced back almost to the crest of the hill, bflt 
he was there posted in great strength in a sunk- 
en road or natural rifle-pit. In the rear were 
strong bodies of the enemy drawn up in a corn- 
field. From the sunken road and the cornfield 
our men had to take a terrific fire of musketry, 
which they returned fiercely. Here the Irish 
Brigade came most conspicuously into the fray. 

" On the left of General French," says Gen- 
eral McClellan in his report, " General Richard- 
son's division was hotly engaged. Having 
crossed the Antietam about 9.30 A. M., at the 
ford crossed by the other divisions of Sumner's 
corps, it moved on a line nearly parallel to the 
Antietam, and formed in a ravine behind the 
high grounds overlooking Roulette's house ; the 
Second (Irish) Brigade, commanded by General 
Meagher, on the right ; the Third brigade, com- 
manded by General Caldwell, on his left, and 
the brigade commanded by Colonel Brooks, 
Fifty-Third Pennsylvania volunteers, in support. 
As the division moved forward to take its posi- 
tion on the field, the enemy directed a fire of 
artillery against it, but, owing to the irregulari- 
ties of the ground, did but little damage. 

" Meagher's brigade, advancing steadily, soon 
8 



170 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHEP.. 

became engaged with the enemy posted to the 
left and in front of Roulette's house. It con- 
tinued to advance under a heavy fire nearl}^ to 
the crest of the hill overlooking Piper's house, 
the enemy being posted in a continuation of the 
sunken road and cornfield before referred to. 
Here the brave Irish brigade opened upon the 
enemy a terrific musketry fire. 

" All of General Sumner's corps was now en- 
gaged : General Sedgwick on the right ; Gen- 
eral French in the centre, and General Richard- 
son on the left. The Irish brigade sustained 
its well-earned reputation. After suffering ter- 
ribly in officers and men, and strewing the 
ground with their enemies as they drove them 
back, their ammunition nearly expended, and 
their commander. General Meagher, disabled 
by the fall of his horse shot under him, this bri- 
gade was ordered to give place to General Cald- 
well's brigade, which advanced to a short dis- 
tance in its rear. The lines were passed by the 
Irish brigade breaking by company to the rear, 
and General Caldwell's by company to the front, 
as steady as on drill." 

Severe indeed was the loss of the Brigade. 
Captain John Kavanagh of the Sixty-Third — 



ANTIETAM. 171 

one of Smith O'Brien's companions at Balin- 
garrj — was shot dead at the head of his com- 
pany, while charging on the concealed works of 
the enemy behind a fence at the crest of the hill ; 
and here fell many other gallant officers. 

The battle of Antietam lasted fourteen hours. 
Nearly two hundred thousand men, and five 
hundred pieces of artillery were engaged. The 
shroud of night enveloped the strugglir^g hosts. 
The battle may be said to have been fought 
upon the very threshold of the North, with 
Pennsylvania, and indeed the National Capital 
itself, almost at the mercy of the enemy. The 
invasion was checked there ; for the Confederate 
army retired south of the Potomac on the next 
day, having lost severely in men and war mate- 
rial, from the time at which they occupied Fred- 
erick, the capital of Maryland, on the 7th of 
September, to the defeat at Antietam on the 17th. 
And so from battle-field to battle-field Meagher 
led his troops, even to the deadly assault on the 
hill at Fredericksburg, until the last fatal fight 
at Chancellorsville, after which he had no longer 
a brigade to command in the Army of the Po- 
tomac. Let me tell the story of this last grand 
battle of the Irish Brigade. 



CHAPTER YIII. 

THE BATTLE OF CHANCEI.LORSVILLE DECIMATION 

OF 'THE BRIGADE MEAGHER's FAREWELL. 

The battle of Chancellorsville, in which the 
Irish Brigade played so conspicuous a part, 
was fought on Sunday, the 3d of May, in the 
vicinity of Mr. Chancellor's house. About 8 
o'clock in the morning the Brigade, which had 
been marching for three da3^s, through forests 
and swamps, was ordered to the front to support 
the Fifth Maine battery. Shot and shell were 
tearing through the woods as the men advanced. 
Meagher, who led the column, had several mi- 
raculous escapes. For two hours they main- 
tained their position in support of the battery, 
which was placed in front of the woods, com- 
manding the plain towards Chancellorsville. It 
was terribly exposed to the fire of the enemy, 
but held its ground until all the horses and men 
were either killed or wounded. Corporal Le~ 



CHANCELLOESVILLE. 173 

broke and one private, finding that tliey could 
no longer work the guns, blew up the caissons. 
The Irish Brigade, under the immediate direc- 
tion of General Meagher, then rushed to save 
the guns. The men seized the ropes, and in the 
midst of a terrific fusilade drew the guns into 
the woods. Several of the gallant fellows were 
shot down, but their comrades pursued the work 
steadily until the battery was out of danger. It 
was the fourth battalion of the Brigade, One 
Hundred and Sixteenth Pennsylvania Volun- 
teers, assisted by several of the Sixty-Ninth 
and Sixty-Third New York, under command of 
Major St. Clair Mulholland, which accomplished 
this important service. Had the battery iallen 
into the hands of the enemy, it would have been 
turned upon the Federal troops, and undoubt- 
edly have done terrible havoc upon their lines. 
This was the second essential service which 
Meagher's Brigade performed in this protracted 
fight. On the previous day, when the Eleventh 
Army Corps was endeavoring to hold a position 
on the Gordonsville road, the assaults of the 
enemy were so terrific that it broke in a panic, 
and fell back pell-mell towards United States 
Pord,— General Howard doing his utmost, in 
vain, to reorganize them. Meagher's Brigade 



174 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

intercepted the fugitives by throwing a line 
across the road and into the woods at Scott's 
Mills. Finding their retreat cut off, they re- 
joined the army. 

When the meu of the Brigade had drawn the 
guns of the Fifth Maine battery off the field, 
General Hancock rode up to General Meagher, 
and called out, "General Meagher, jou com- 
mand the retreat !" In this action the Irish 
Brigade numbered onlyiive hundred and twenty 
men. It had ere this time been reduced by 
continual fighting to only half a regiment. In 
this battle fell Captain John C. Lynch, of the 
Sixty-Third New York Volunteers, a gallant offi- 
cer, a genial, social, and estimable gentleman. 
"While leaning against a tree in the woods, di- 
recting the fire of his company, he was struck 
by a ball in the arm, but though seriously hurt, 
he refused to leave his post. In a moment a 
shell came hurtling along, and striking the brave 
young officer in its course, literally dashed him 
to pieces. The scabbard of his sword, bent 
like a hook, was all that was left.'' His remains 
w^ere never recovered. 

Chancellorsville was the last grand battle in 
which the Brigade fought under its old com- 
mander. Keduced in numbers from its once 



HIS BRIGADE DECIMATED. 175 

flourishing condition, it presented now not men 
enough to comprise a regiment. From the first 
moment that it became a component part of the 
Army of the Potomac it shared every danger, 
aind participated in almost every conflict. No 
portion of that grand army endured more hard- 
ships, or cheerfully made more sacrifices. There 
was not a camp, however dismal and cheerless ; 
not a march, however weary and painful ; not a 
picket-liile, however exposed ; not a turning 
point on any battle-field, that the green flag was 
not seen, that the steady tramp and the ringing 
cheer was not heard, and the stalwart arm of 
the Irish soldier was not felt with terrible effect. 
More than decimated as it was after the battles 
of Chancellorsville and Scott's Mills, its effi- 
ciency as a brigade was no longer possible, and 
no one was more conscientiously convinced of 
this than General Meagher himself. After the 
heroic but destructive assault on the enemy's 
batteries at Fredericksburg, which left his com- 
mand sadly reduced, he appealed to the War 
Department for permission to withdraw his Bri- 
gade from active duty in the field for a brief 
time, to enable the regiments to fill up their 
thinned ranks ; but the Secretary of AVar gave 
no heed to the request ; did not even condescend 



176 THOMAS FIIANCIS MEAGHER. 

to reply to it, although the facts embraced in 
General Meagher's statement were undoubtedly 
well known to the War Department. 

The operations of the Irish Brigade in the 
battles on the Kappahannock were communi- 
cated to the author at the time, in the following 
terms, in a letter from General Meagher : — 

" Four days previous to the main body of the 
army crossing the Kappahannock, the Brigade 
was occupied in guarding Bank's and the Uni- 
ted States Ford, — the latter being seven miles 
above the former, and the former four miles dis- 
tant from the camp of the Brigade. On the 
night of the 29th, the regiments of the Brigade 
at the United States Ford moved down to 
Bank's Ford, and there rejoined the rest of my 
command. Two hours later, the entire com- 
mand moved off to the Upper Ford, effecting a 
march of nine miles in utter darkness, with 
great alacrity and spirit ; arriving on the ground 
where the rest of the army were bivouacked, 
within a mile and a half of the Ford, at break 
of day. That evening the Brigade crossed the 
river. Four of the regiments (or rather four 
of the. poor little skeletons of regiments) com- 
posing the Brigade were ordei-ed to take up a 



1 



CHANCELLORSVILLE. 177 

j)osition two miles off the main road from the 
Ford to Chancellorsville, and hold it firmly ; 
that position being on the extreme left of the 
Federal line, and approached by an excellent 
by-road leading from Fredericksburg. The 
fifth regiment — the Eighty -Eighth of the New 
York Volunteers — was detached by order of 
Major-General Hancock, commanding the Di- 
vision, and proceeded to the front, where they 
occupied a position until the morning of the 3d 
of May, being stationed on the extreme left of 
the front at Chancellorsville, in support of a 
section of Thomas's battery (Fourth United 
States Artillery), which commanded the main 
road leading from. Fredericksburg, through 
Chancellorsville, to Gordonsville. Qn the even- 
ing of the 1st of May, the four regiments of my 
Brigade were ordered to the right, and there 
took up a strong position, under my immediate 
command and instructions. My little force was 
posted to the best advantage, and established 
two guns of Pettit's famous rifled battery in po- 
sition. Whilst at this point (and it was a most 
important one, and vital to be held because it 
commanded the main road to the Ford and 
Chancellorsville, and in the hands of the enemy 
would have been fatal to our army) the- Brigade 



178 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

rendered the most valuable service in driving 
back the torrent of fugitives from the Eleventh 
Corps, whom the sudden onslaught and terrific 
musketry of the enemy had routed, and com- 
pletely struck them with panic. About 8 o'clock 
the following morning, May the 3d, orders were 
received to march my command at once to the 
front, which was effected promptly and with the 
greatest enthusiasm — the little Brigade passing 
with a truly soldierly step and dash tlirough 
long lines and masses of troops drawn up on 
either side of the road leading to the front. 
Taking up a position, in line of battle, a few 
paces to the rear of the large brick house at 
Chancellorsville, which had been until a few 
minutes before General Hooker's headquarters, 
the Brigade was exposed for two hours and a 
half to a most galling fire of rifle-balls, canis- 
ter, shrapnel, and shell. Nevertheless, without 
swerving an inch, they held their ground, until 
General Hancock, riding past from the front, 
where he had bravely stood until the enemy's 
infantry w^ere but a few hundred paces from 
him, ordered me to form my command at once 
in column and bring up the rear. This was 
steadily and fearlessly done, — the Eighty- 
Eighth New^ York Volunteers, under Colonel 



HOLDING THEIR GROUND. 179 

Patrick Kelly, being the very last regiment of 
the Federal army to leave the front. They had 
only done so ten minutes before the enemy's 
infantry dashed over our breast-works and took 
possession with tremendous cheering. Previous 
to the Irish Brigade bringing up the retreat, 
a considerable portion of it — chiefly the One 
Hundred and Sixteenth Pennsylvania Yolun- 
teers, under Major St. Clair MulhoUand — were 
engaged in hauling off the abandoned guns of 
the Fifth Maine battery, which had been utterly 
destroyed, within ten minutes after it had taken 
position at the front, by the terrific fire of the 
enemy's artillery. Three of the Eighty-Eighth 
mounted the horses attached to one of the pieces 
(the gunners and drivers having all been killed 
or desperately wounded) , and rattled off with it 
in glorious style. 

"For the two days and nights intervening 
between this disastrous morning and that of the 
6th of May (the morning the army recrossed 
the Rappahannock), the Irish Brigade, along 
with the other brigades of Hancock's Division, 
was right in front on the new line of defence, 
and held their ground, under the incessant fire 
of the enemy's sharp-shooters and pickets most 
nobly." 



180 THOMAS FEANCIS MEAGHER. 

In the position which the Brigade vvas phiced 
after the battle of Chancellorsville, General 
Meagher resolved to tender his resignation as 
commander of the remnant left to him, which 
he did in the following words : — 

" Headquahters Irish Brigade, 
' "Hancock's Division, Couch's Corps, 

" Army of the Potomac, May 8tb, 1863- 

" Major John Hancock, Assist. Adj't Gen'l. 

"I beg most respectfully to tender you, and 
through you to the proper authorities, my re- 
signation as Brigadier-General commanding 
what was once known as the Irish Brigade. 
That Brigade no-longer exists. The assault on 
the enemy's works on the 13th December last 
reduced it to something less than a minimum 
regiment of infantry. For several weeks it re- 
mained in this exhausted condition. Brave fel- 
lows from the convalescent camp and from the 
sick-beds at home gradually re-enforced this 
handful of devoted men. Nevertheless, it failed 
to reach the strength and proportions of any- 
thing like an effective regiment. 

" These facts I represented, as clearly and 
forcibly as it was in my power to do, in a memo- 
rial to the Secretary of War ; in which memo- 



Meagher's resignation. 181 

rial I prayed that a brigade which had rendered 
such service, and incurred such distressing 
losses, should be temporarily relieved from duty 
in the field, so as to give it time and opportu- 
nity in some measure to renew itself. 

" The memorial was in vain. It never even 
was acknowledged. The depression caused by 
this ungenerous and inconsiderate treatment of 
a gallant remnant of a brigade that had never 
once failed to do its duty most liberally and he- 
roicall}^ almost unfitted me to remain in com- 
mand. True, however, to those who had been 
true to me — true to a position which I consid- 
ered sacred under the circumstances — I re- 
mained with what was left of my brigade ; and 
though feeling that it was to a sacrifice rather 
than to a victory that we were going, I accom- 
panied them, and led them through all the op- 
erations required of them at Scott's Mills and 
Chancellorsville beyond the Rappahannock. 

" A mere handful of my command did its 
duty at those positipns with a fidelity and reso- 
lution which won for it the admiration of the 
army. It would be my greatest happiness, as 
it would surely be my highest honor, to remain 
in the companionship and charge of such men ; 



182 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

but to do SO any longer would be to perpetuate 
a public deception, in which the hard-won hon- 
ors of good soldiers, and in them the military 
reputation of a brave old race, would inevitably 
be involved and compromised. I cannot be a 
party to this wrong. My heart, my conscience, 
my pride, all that is truthful, manful, sincere, 
and just within me forbid it. 

" In tendering my resignation, however, as 
the Brigadier-General in command of this poor 
vestige and rehc of the Irish Brigade, I beg 
sincerely to assure you that my services, in any 
capacity that can prove useful, are freely at the 
summons and disposition of the Government of 
the United States. That Government, and 
the cause, and the liberty, tlie noble memories, 
and the future it represents, are entitled, un- 
questionably and unequivocally, to the life of 
every citizen who has sworn allegiance to it, and 
partaken of its grand protection. But while I 
offer my own life to sustain this good Govern- 
ment, I feel it to be my first duty to do nothing 
that will wantonly imperil the lives of others, or, 
what would be still more grievous and irrepara- 
ble, inflict sorrow and humiliation upon a race, 
who, having lost almost everything else, find in 
their character for courage and loyalty an in- 



THE PARTING. 183 

valuable gift, which I, for one, will not be so 
Tain or selfish as to endanger. 

*' I have the honor to be most respectfully 
and truly yours, 

" Thomas Francis Meagher, 

" Biisjadier-General Commandino-.'* 

On the 14th of May, General Meagher's re- 
signation was officially accepted. In his with- 
drawal from the honors and emoluments of his 
command the grand old passion for the dignity 
of his race asserted its supremacy over all other 
sentiments, save that of averting the wanton 
slaughter of his brave soldiers. 

It may be imagined how keenl}^ the resigna- 
tion of General Meagher was felt by the men 
he had so long been associated with in scenes 
of honor and of danger — who arrayed them- 
selves under the war-worn flags — 

" Few, and faint, but fearless still !" 

Though no longer Meagher's Irish Brigade, 
the fragment of the original organization had 
still some work to do, and they lost none of 
their old prestige on the battle-fields that suc- 
ceeded Chancellorsville. 

Colonel Patrick Kelly, of the Eighty-Eighth, 



184 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

assumed command of the Brigade, as senior 
officer, after General Meaglier's resignation was 
■officially announced. On the same day, the 
officers of the Sixtj-Nintli, Sixty-Third, and 
Eightj^-Eighth made application for the con- 
solidation of the few men they commanded into 
one regiment. Alas ! there was not a full regi- 
ment left of the once glorious Brigade. Captain 
W. J. Nagle, of the Eighty-Eighth, writing from 
the camp near Falmouth, on the 18th of May, 
1863, to a New York journal, says : — " The Irish 
Brigade has ceased to exist. The resignation 
of our beloved • chief, General Meagher, has 
been accepted, and with him go our hearts, our 
hopes, and our aspirations. The history of the 
Irish Brigade in the United States Army is 
closed !" 

The parting of the General and his comrades 
was sorrowful and affecting. It was more than 
this — it was sublime. The Commander who 
shared equal risks and endured equal privations 
with the humblest soldier in the ranks, when 
necessity demanded it ; who had cheered the 
weary column on the march ; enjoyed and in- 
spired the pleasures of many an encampment ; 
who had confronted danger on the battle-field, 
the foremost amongst those who never knew 



''GOD BLESS YOU." 185 

fear, and wlio trusted to his leadership, was 
compelled by a sense of duty, from which there 
was no appeal, to sever the ties of long associ- 
ation and companionship, which mutual danger 
and mutual suffering had rendered sacred. We 
cannot be surprised, then, that tears rolled down 
veteran cheeks in that column which received 
the farewell of its chieftain ; that a sad and 
solemn— "God bless you"— in broken voices 
accompanied the kindly grasp of the hand 
which General Meagher gave to every man in 
the line. 




CHAPTEK IX. 

THE ETOWAH COMMAND — DEFENCE OF CHATTANOO- 
GA RECOGNITION OF MEAGHER's SERVICES. 



The Government was not long in accepting 
Meagher's proffered services in a new scene, 
from the battle-fields of Virginia. When in No- 
vember, 1864, Major-General Steadman joined 
the forces of General Thomas at Nashville, the 
command of the Etowah District was transfer- 
red to Acting Major-General Meagher. The 
headquarters were then at Chattanooga. The 
district was quite an extensive one, and com- 
prised nearly three hundred miles of railroad, 
and fully two hundred miles of river communi- 
cation ; all of which the new commandant had 
to protect with a force of 12,000 infantry, two 
hundred guns, on the forts and in the field, and 
three regiments of cavalry. Iq this position he 
was isolated from other portions of the Federal 



THE ETOWAH COMMAND. 187 

army, and had to depend entirely upon his 
own resources. Here came into play Meagher's 
capacity for meeting emergencies, a capacity 
which was never wanting when self-reliance and 
resolute action were the most effective weapons. 
As he calmed the passions of the crowd in the 
streets of his native Waterford at a moment 
when one word from his lips would perchance 
have precipitated an act of useless bloodshed ; 
or when he marched defiantly, in company with 
Devih Reilly and his other colleagues, through 
the mass of armed police in the streets of Dub- 
lin, at a time when the Viceregal Government 
would have been only too glad to provoke a col- 
lision with the populace ; or as he calmly stood 
face to face with ignominious death in Clonmel 
Court House ; so did he meet the responsibili- 
ty of the Etowah command. He had no army 
to back him. His district was fairly overrun by 
guerrillas, with whom he sometimes dealt with 
the full severity of martial law. He had to 
furnish supplies to General Steadman through 
an unprotected country, which he did promptly 
as fast as they were needed ; and thus, for seven 
weeks he held that part of Tennessee, until, on 
the 7th of January, 1865, General Steadman 
returned to relieve him — Meagher then being 



188 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

ordered to join the army of General Sherman, 
on its famous march to the sea. But Meagher 
did not participate in that expedition, and was 
therefore spared the horrors from which his gen- 
erous nature would have shrunk with as much 
revolt as from the desolation in Ireland which 
he was compelled to witness years before, in 
1847, and which tinged even his most genial 
moods with sadness. 

Before his departure from Chattanooga, Gen- 
eral Steadman tendered to General Meagher a 
full recognition of his services in these words : — 

" Headquarters, District of the Etowah, ) 
" Chattanooga, Jan. 12, 18G5. I 

" My Dear General — 

" As you are about leaving this Department 
with your command, to take part in the pro- 
jected campaign of General Sherman, I beg 
leave to express to you my profound regret that 
the fortunes of war call you from this Depart- 
ment. Your administration of the affairs of the 
District of the Etowah, while communications 
were interrupted, and your command isolated 
by the presence of Hood's army before Nash- 
ville, as well as your splendid success in pro- 
tecting the railroad and tsxegraph to Knoxville 



GEN. steadman's lettee. 189 

and Dalton, tlie steamboat transportation on 
the Tennessee river, the pnblic property ex- 
posed to capture by the enemy's cavahy, and 
the harmony and good order maintained by you 
throughout the District, during the trying pe- 
riod in which all these responsibilities devolved 
upon you, have given me much satisfaction, and 
secured for you the confidence and esteem of 
the Major-General commanding the Depart- 
ment, as well as the officers of the entire com- 
mand. 

" All deeply regret the necessity w^hich takes 
you from us ; but the hope that you may be 
pleasantly situated, and have a command wor- 
thy of your splendid abilities, reconciles us to 
the separation. 

" I am, General, w ith esteem, your friend, 
" James B. Ste adman, 

" Major-General Commanding. 
" Brig. Gen. T. F. Meagher, 

" Com. Prov'l Div., Army of the Tennessee." 

General Meagher's response was of course 
characteristic, and rich in glowing language. 
For example, in alluding to the good-will of the 
citizens of Chattanooga, and the civil officials 
of the Department, he says : — 



190 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

" The former proved, with the liveliest good- 
humor and euthuwsiasm in their spontaneous ac- 
ceptance of the proposition of a civic guard, 
and all the obligations and penalties attached 
to it, their readiness to fall in witli the regularly 
organized garrison, and fight to the death, side 
by side with their enlisted brothers, at a mo- 
ment's notice, should the daring of the enemy 
of the American flag, its honor, and its glory, 
have summoned them to the defence of Chatta- 
nooga, and the vindication of the heroic memo- 
ries that crown the mountains that guard it, and 
render sacred, as well as notable for all time, the 
waters that chaunt without ceasing — whether 
A\'ildly in the storm, or solemnly in the beautiful 
calm night, or lovingly in the sunshine, in the 
midst of green leaves and the perfumes of the 
summer — the eternal lyrics of the dead and liv- 
ing conquerors to whom they owe their fame." 

And much more he said in the same strain ; 
speaking all the while modestly of himself, but 
sparing no gallant words of praise for those 
who served under him. This was his wont 
throughout his whole military career. He left 
his own praise, his valor, his devotion, to be re- 
corded by those who loved him; but for his 



Meagher's response. 191 

men and officers he reserved the right to speak 
himself, and this he did in his official reports, 
and in his public and private correspondence, 
most lavishly. His fresh, hearty, frank nature 
did not change with time or exile. From boy- 
hood until death, it was the same rare jewel 
which sparkled so brightly in the dual crown of 
the hero and the martyr which pressed his fore- 
head almost before the fulness of manhood was 
upon him. 





CHAPTEK X. 



HIS CAREER IlSf MONTANA TERRITORY — MEAGHER 

APPOINTED SECRETARY AND ACTING GOVERNOR 

HE FIGHTS THE POLITICIANS RAISING THE MI- 
LITIA JOURNEY TO FORT BENTON — HIS DEATH. 

Meagher's career as a soldier ended with Lis 
brilliant services in tlie command of the Etowah 
district. The President, Andrew Johnson, re- 
cognizing his merits, and acknowledging the 
obligations of the Government, tendered him 
the Secretaryship of the Territory of Montana, 
which he cheerfully accepted. Life in this new, 
wild, grand territory, with its unsettled popula- 
tion, the possible dangers attaching to the posi- 
tion, the fresh developments in mineral re- 
sources which the territory then promised, and 
which it has since realized, all these were 
charms irresistible to Meagher. The unavoid- 
able absence from the territory of the Governor, 
Hon. Sydney Edgerton, the interregnum pend- 



LETTER FROM HIS SON. 193 

ing the appointment of Green Clay Smith, ne- 
cessarily imposed upon the new Secretary the 
duties of Acting Governor, and from his induc- 
tion to office until the sad close, he held that 
position. 

Previous to iiis starting for the West, Meagher 
was passing some days at the delightful resi- 
dence of the late Daniel Devlin in Manhattan- 
ville. Datiijg a note from this place on Sept. 
22d, 1864, he urged me to come there and see 
him, saying — " Do come, and bring any true 
friend (or two) of mine along with you, you can 
find. It may be the last time (God only knows) 
that you shall see me, for I go to a fierce and 
frightful region of gorillas !" But I did see him 
later than that, for owing to delays in the Fiske 
expedition he did not depart until the following 
summer. The last interview was at his resi- 
dence in East Twenty-third street, when I 
grasped his hand at what proved to be a final 
parting. There was no sadness on either side, 
because the veil was not lifted from the dismal 
future, nor could we penetrate its mists. Nei- 
ther dreamed that it was a last meeting. 
Meagher, indeed, was particularly joyous that 
day. I found him leaning against the mantel- 
piece, perusing a letter which he had just re- 



194 THOMAS FBANCIS MEAGHEE. 

ceived from his boy in Wateiford, a fine photo- 
graph of whom was before him ; looking in 
almost every lineament a counterpart of his 
gallant father. He was laughing at the pleas- 
ant and loving things the lad had written, and 
handed me the letter, with a proud allusion to 
the manliness of its style. As this youth was 
born in Ireland, of course Meagher had never 
looked upon his face. He lived only upon the 
memories of his childish correspondence, and 
such delineations as this one, famished by the 
hand of art. 

On his westward journey the impression 
seemed to grow upon him that he would never 
return, though his subsequent correspondence 
was more hopeful. Writing to me from St. 
Paul's, Minnesota, on the 27th of July, 1865, 
while en route to Montana, he says, in reference 
to a work relating to the " Irish Brigade," on 
which the present writer was then engaged — 

" Now that I am on the eve of starting on what 
may be a dangerous expedition (for the Indi- 
ans, we understand, along the route are fiend- 
ishly ferocious), and I may not live to vindicate 
myself, I am justified, I think, in entreating of 
you, as one of the very truest friends I have 



A.EPJVAL AT VIEGIXIA CITY. 195 

known in America, tliat you liave full justice 
done me. Apart from this consideration, I de- 
sire that this little monument, at least, will be 
dedicated to the memory of our brave boys, and 
that in the permanent commemoration of their 
generous and heroic services to the nation, an 
argument shall be planted deep and irrefutably 
in the history of the times against those who 
hereafter, in social or public life, may be dis- 
posed to disparage our race, or assail it in a 
prescriptive spirit. 

" Very affectionately yours, 

"T. F. Meagher." 

The reputation of his " brave boys" never 
seemed to pass from his thoughts ! The heroic 
record of " our race" must not be disparaged, if 
sword or pen can shield it from tarnish ! This 
latter idea was the passion and purpose of all 
his later years. He wrought it into practical 
life on the field of battle. He preached it, in 
words of rare and fiery eloquence, from every 
rostrum. He dreamed of it, and clung to it, as 
his words just quoted show, during his distant 
journeyings on the path to those new scenes and 
duties from which he never returned. 

His arrival at Yirginia City, the present seat 



196 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

of government in Montana, he announces in 
this hurried and exuberant fashion, after being 
three months on the tedious route from the Mis- 
sissippi to the interior : — 

" Virginia. Citt, > 

" IMoNTANA Territory, Oct. 6, 1865. S 
" My Dear Lyons — 

" The enclosed slips from our local paper — 
the ' Montana Post' — will inform you of my ar- 
rival at my destination at last, and my being 
Acting Governor of the richest territory of the 
Union. I want you, like a good fellow, to have 
this announced in the 'Herald f and, if you can, 
it would gratify me to have the extracts tran- 
scribed. I have not time to write anything more 
to you just now — will do so, however, before long. 
" Believe me, with truest regards, 

" Most cordially your friend, 

" T. F. Meagher." 

Of course he had no time to write more just 
then ; for were not the duties of state falling 
thick upon him, and the politicians and place- 
hunters hemming him in with a cordon of greedy 
applications? But he did write afterwards to 
all his friends pleasant and cheerful letters, 
enough to keep the territorial post-offices busy. 



DIFFICULTIES OYEECOME. 197 

. With fidelity to his trust, and in strict accord- 
ance with the political opinions he conscien- 
tiously entertained, those duties were performed. 
He had difficulties to overcome which to a man 
of less firmness might have proved insurmount- 
able. The Territory of Montana, young as it 
was, was not exempt from the dire mischief of 
partisanship. The papers, on heralding his ap- 
proach in words of enthusiastic praise, did not 
fail to drop a hint about " hireling agitators and 
selfish politicians" whose influence he would 
have to combat. All these he had to meet and 
grapple with on the very threshold of his ca- 
reer, in September, 1865. For the matter of 
that, his whole Governorship embraced a con- 
stant struggle, bravely and persistently con- 
ducted with all Meagher's known courage and 
undaunted obstinac}^, for the recognition of pop- 
ular rights, and his own authority to defend 
them. He had a subtle party to contend with ; 
a party that showed in their bitter opposition 
to his manly, honest policy, the disappointment 
they felt on finding in the new Governor a man 
who, though he was a " soldier of the Union," 
was not a slave to faction, and could not be 
moulded to their purposes ; nor could his fine 
spirit be dragged through the muddy channels 



198 THOMAS FEANCIS MEAGHEK. 

of partisanship. The poHticians could not get 
hold of him, and so the radical portion of them 
set to work to secretly abuse him, and intrigue 
against the measures he proposed for the good 
government of the Territory. Meagher's polit- 
ical opinions at this time cannot be better ex- 
pressed than in his own words, contained in a 
letter written to a Democratic Convention in 
Montana. He says :— 

*' As a Democrat I took the field — as a Dem- 
ocrat went through the war : the war over, I am 
precisely the same I was when it broke out. 
The Democratic party, from the day of its foun- 
dation to this hour, was essentially the party of 
the Union, the party of national aims, civil and 
religious liberty — Americanism in its broadest, 
loftiest, grandest signification. Satisfied of this, 
I could belong to no other party. Belonging to 
it, I feel that I belong to the nation, to its great 
traditions, and that patriotism which saw in the 
Constitution and the well-defined government 
of the States, peace, honor, and prosperity for 
the nation throughout its length and breadth. 
There are few people who can forget, though 
there may be many who will deny, the delight 
with which the Democratic support, given to 



FIRST OFFICIAL ACTION. 199 

the Eepublicaii Administration from tlie outset 
to the close of the civil war, was acknowledged 
by the partisans of the Administration. With- 
out that support, it was admitted, and by none 
more "readily than by the President and his 
Cabinet, that the war for the Union must prove 
a failure." 

The first official action of the Acting Gover- 
nor, for the purpose of voting supplies for the 
expenses of the Government, was to call togeth- 
er the Legislature. His constitutional right to 
do so was disputed, and indeed heat first doubt- 
ed it himself, but on consideration, like Andrew 
Jackson, Governor Meagher " took the respon- 
sibility," called the Legislature to assemble, and 
defended his course afterwards very ably in his 
Message, and in a speech delivered at the Dem- 
ocratic Convention in Helena, February 21st, 
1866. The details of this part of his official 
career would be tedious. It is enough to know, 
and for those who knew and loved him, to feel 
proud of, that his official career was chamcter- 
ized by great firmness and discretion, and a 
personal boldness Avhich was the distinguishing 
feature of his whole gallant and stormy life. 
The attacks by the Indians upon the residents 



200 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

of Fort BentoD, on the Upper Missouri, com- 
pelled him to call for volunteers, as there was 
no militia in the territory. As he said himself 
with his usual good-humor, which was never 
suppressed, even in moments of difficulty or 
danger, " I am Commander-in-Chief, not of an 
invincible, but of an invisible militia." It was 
in procuring the armament for these vol inteers, 
who responded cheerfully to his call, that the 
circumstances occurred which led to his death, 
a lamentable event, of which — with poignant 
sorrow — I shall have to speak hereafter. 

Beset as he was by the Kepublican politicians 
who sought to rule the Territorj^ and hoped to 
control him, Meagher was unyielding in his de- 
sign to govern for the people, and in favor of 
their interests, despite what he called the " ma- 
lignant hostility of the more conspicuous and 
dictatorial of the Kepublican party." Accord- 
ing to the means at his command, and the time 
allotted to him, he succeeded in doing this to 
the fullest of his expectations. Charges were 
laid against him by his political enemies touch- 
ing his " loyalty," that he was not -unfriendly to 
the South — which the bigots expected he would 
be — and somewhat favored the interests of 
Southern men in the Territory of Montana. To 



SPEECH AT HELENA. 201 

these inuencloes (for they never extended be- 
3^ond that wretched class of slander) Meagher 
answered w^ith this noble declaration of his sen- 
timents, clothed in that beanty of language 
which, like the silvery tongues of angels, flowed 
as freely from his lips as mountain streams bub- 
ble forth in spring-time when loosed from the 
frosty chains of wiiiter. This is what he said 
in his speech at Helena, on the 21st of Febru- 
ary, 1866 : — 

" On the battle-field, which they had heroi- 
cally held for four tempestuous years, the sol- 
diers of the South had lowered their colors 
and sheathed their swords. The spirit in which 
they had surrendered, as well as the spirit with 
which they fought, entitled them to respect, 
honorable consideration, and the frank confi- 
dence of their adversaries, and the generosity 
of the colossal power to which they had been 
forced to capitulate. These were no new senti- 
ments of his. A few days after the assault on 
Fredericksburg, December, 1862, at a public en- 
tertainment in the city of New York, he pro- 
posed, ' The heroism of both parties — united 
tliey could whip the world.' What he had said 
and done during the war, the same was he now 



202 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

prepared to repeat, sliould another rebellion be 
set on foot, and the Eepublic be declared in 
danger. But the war over, he, for one, would 
not have planted thorns in the graves where the 
olive had taken root. Here, at all events, here 
among the great mountains of the New World, 
no echoes should be awakened save those that 
proclaimed truthful and glorious peace, the 
everlasting brotherhood of those who had been 
foes upon the battle-field, the triumphant reign 
of industry, and another pillar and crowji of 
gold to the nation that had been restored. In 
the Divine sacrament of forgiveness, love, and 
patriotism, let them dedicate, with an irrevoca- 
ble pledge, that beautiful and superb domain of 
theirs, to the grow^th of a stalwart Democracy, 
the consolidation of liberty with law, the vindi- 
cation of the Republic against the malevolence 
of faction, nationality against sectionalism, an 
enlightened civilization, religion without puri- 
tanism, and loyalty without humiliation." 

And thus it was that Meagher talked to the 
people of Montana with all his ardent fiery elo- 
quence, in public halls, and conventions, and 
through the columns of every available news- 
paper, just as he talked in Ireland "twenty 



HIS WIFE. 203 

golden years ago," when he had a " cause" to 
advocate which gave force and action to every 
fibre of his heart and brain. There was really 
no " cause" in Montana except the assertion of 
manhood in opposition to political intrigue, and 
we may be sure that in Meagher's hands that 
cause was well taken care of. 

For a long time before the close of his career 
General Meagher contemplated resigning his 
official position. He began to weary of the un- 
productive labors of public office, and in sooth 
he had good reason ; for his services and sacri- 
fices, though graciously acknowledged, were not 
abundantly repaid. With what exuberant joy- 
ousness he wrote to me announcing the arrival 
of his wife at Fort Benton — although with a 
weary journey over the plains still before her — 
when she was on her way to rejoin him in his 
new home beyond the Bocky Mountains ; and 
what a new life he pictured for himself in the 
future, when, as he said, strengthened by her 
presence, the burden of his public duties would 
be lightened, while they continued, and the 
prospect of carving out a fortune for himself, 
which was just opening up, would be all the 
brighter because she was there to cheer and 
encourage him ! But Fate had wihed a difterent 



204 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

termination to his new hopes and prospects. 
While still in harness, before his resignation 
could be accepted, the Indian troubles, and the 
necessity of raising and arming militia to pro- 
tect the settlers, compelled him to undertake the 
arduous duty which led to his death. He had 
travelled thirty miles in the saddle, under a 
scorching July sun, after superintending the ar- 
rival of arms and munitions for the equipment 
of the militia. He reached Fort Benton in the 
evening of July the 1st, 1867, wearied out from 
several days' labors. There being no accommo- 
dation at the post, he took up his quarters in a 
state-room on board the old battered Missouri 
steamer G. A. Thompson, which was lying at 
the levee, preparatory to making her trip down 
the river. Tired as he was he undertook to 
write to some friends before retiring — one of 
whom, at least, Eichard O' Gorman, received 
the epistle addressed to him. The state-room 
was on the upper deck, and the guards in front 
of the door were broken by a previous accident. 
Between nine and ten o'clock he left his room. 
The night was dark. Obscurity partially en- 
veloped the boat. There was a coil of rope on 
the verge of the deck, over which he stumbled, 
throwing him off his balance, and while grasp- 



HIS DEATH. 205 

ing vainly for the guard, — which was not there, 
— he fell into the dark, rushing river, then flow- 
ing towards its destination in the mighty Mis- 
sissippi at a rate of nearly ten miles an hour. 
He struck the guard of the lower deck in his 
descent, which probably disabled hina, as the 
men on the boat declared that he uttered a fear- 
ful groan before they heard the splash which 
announced the accident. Gallant swimming for 
life — and he battled bravely for it — availed 
nothing. The efforts of willing hearts and 
hands could bring no succor. His calls for aid 
wer^ promptly responded to. For a few brief 
moments all was activity, on the deck and on 
the shore, and with sach light as a few lanterns 
could throw upon the turgid waters, the strug- 
gling form of the gallant soldier, the polished 
orator, the fiery, ardent patlriot, beloved by 
friends and honored even by foes, was seen, and 
was swept forever from the sight of man. 

Consternation and grief followed the an- 
nouncement of this calamity as the news spread 
throughout the country. Those who remem- 
bered Meagher in his early years, and watched 
the development of his rich and rare mind^ 
through all the vicissitudes of an extraordinary 



206 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

and eventful life, recalled tlie words of Bjron 
on tlie death of Richard Brinsley Sheridan : — 

" E'en as the tenderness that hour distils, 
When summer's day declines along the hills ; 
So feels the fulness of the heart and eyes, 
When all of Genius that can perish — dies." 

A magnificent Eequiem High Mass was cel- 
ebrated at the Church of St. Francis Xavier, 
Sixteenth street, New York, on the 14th of Au- 
gust, for the repose of the soul of the departed 
General, under the auspices of his brother offi- 
cers of the Irish Brigade. On the same even- 
ing, Richard O'Gorman delivered a eulogy on 
the character of the deceased at Cooper Insti- 
tute, in which, after detailing the circumstances 
of Meagher's death, as above related, he closed 
with the following touching peroration : — 

'' So he died. ' Would that he had died on 
the battle-field,' I think I hear some friend say. 
Would that he had fallen there, with the flag he 
loved waving over him, and the shout of tri- 
umph ringing in his ears ; would that his grave 
were on some Irish hillside, wdtli the green turf 
above him. No ; God knows best how, and 



A EULOGY. 207 

where, and when we are to die. His will be 
done. But Meagher has bequeathed his mem- 
ory to us, to guard it, and save it from evil 
tongues, that might not respect the majesty of 
death. What matter to him now whether men 
praise or blame ? The whole world's censure 
could not hurt him now. But for us, the friends 
who are left behind ; for you, his companions 
in arms ; for me, who was the friend of his 
youth, and who have loved him ever ; for the 
sake of those who are nearer and dearer to him, 
of whose grief I cannot bring myself to speak — 
of his father, his brother, of his son, on whose 
face he never looked ; for the sake, more than 
all, of that noble lady whose endearing love was 
the pride and blessing of his life ; for all this 
Ave do honor to his memory, and strive to weave, 
as it were, this poor chaplet of flowers over his 
grave. His faults lie gently on him. For he 
had faults, as all of us have. But he had vir- 
tues too, in whose light his errors were unseen 
and forgotten. In4iis youth he loved the land 
of his birth, and freely gave all he had to give, 
even his life, to save her and do her honor. He 
never forgot her. He never said a word that 
was not meant to help her and raise her. Some 



208 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. ' 



thingi=; he did say from time to time, which I did 
not agree with, that seemed to me hasty, pas- 
sionate, unjust. When men speak much and 
often, they cannot help sometimes speaking 
wrong. But he said always what he thought ; 
he neyer uttered a word that was unmanly or 
untrue to the cause that was darling to his youth. 
In Ireland, in America, he invited no man to 
danger that he was not ready to share. Never 
forget this : he gave all, lost all, for the land of 
his birth. He risked all for the land of his 
adoption, was her true and loyal soldier, and in 
the end died in her service. For these things, 
either in Ireland or America, he will not soon 
be forgotten, and the grateful instinct of two 
people will do him justice and cherish his mem- 
ory in the heart of hearts. If it be, as we of 
the ancient faith are taught to believe, that the 
highest heavens are joined to this earth b}^ a 
mystic chain of sympathy, of which the links 
are prayers and blessings which ascend and 
descend, keeping ever the sacred^ communion 
eternal and unbroken — if thus fervent prayer on 
earth can reach the throne of God, the friend 
of my youth can never be forgotten there. His 
battle of life is fought. His work is done ; his 



HIS GENEROSITY. 209 

liour of repose is come, and love can utter no 
fonder aspiration than .tliat which was chanted 
in the sad ceremonies of this morning. ' May 
he rest in peace. Amen !' " 

There are few men in our day — but still there 
are a few — whose lives were more varied by re- 
markable incidents, more checkered, more twist- 
ed and tortured by the whirlpools of fate than 
was that of Meagher, and yet he bore himself 
gallantly through it all. Not always prosper- 
ous in worldly things, yet he treated adversity 
with a disdainful pride, even at the moment 
when his unselfishness inspired him to give, 
while prudence might have whispered him to 
retain. But he knew little of prudence in thesf5 
matters. Generosity mastered him always. 
The brilliancy of his wit, the love of all that 
was gallant and noble, and his detestation of 
all that was ignoble in human nature, that con- 
stantly pervaded his social life, those who have 
shared his companionship vrill not forget. The 
fresh bright memory of these attributes will re- 
main, with the recollection of his joyous laugh, 
the flash of his deep blue eyes, sometimes 
sparkling with merriment, oftentimes intensified 
by some passionate thought, and not unfre- 



210 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 

quently clouded with a shadow of compassion- 
ate reo-ret, — for Meagher never heard of sorrow 
or want in one of his race, that his heart did 
not resjDond, no matter what the condition of 
his exchequer might be. 

To those who knew him I leave these thoughts 
to be hoarded in the corners of their memory. 
To the readers of these pages I submit the 
story of one in whom genius and gallantry com- 
bined to make a notable, a loveable, and an 
enduring character, which will not be obliter- 
ated from the records of future history. 




APPENDIX 



Although, in the text of this volume, many 
of Meagher's most characteristic speeches, and 
occasional fragments from his writings, were 
necessarily interwoven to complete the story of 
his life, and give it a consecutive form, there 
remains much of what he has spoken and writ- 
ten that should be embalmed in the memory of 
his countrj'men. While it would be impossible 
to embody in these pages all the splendid efforts 
he has left behind him, — most of which have 
already been printed from time to time, — often 
imperfectly, — in the columns of newspapers, 
which are read and forgotten — there are yet 
numerous selections which should properly find 
a permanent place here. They might perchance 
be more wisely chosen, but the intention is to 
reproduce a few illustrations of Meagher's ear- 



212 APPENDIX. 

Her oratorical efforts, when his genius ilkimi- 
nated the pathway upon which his young man- 
hood was leading him to heroism and to mar- 
tyrdom ; — illustrations, also, of his more mature 
thoughts, and his almost unaltered method of 
expressing them, when at a later period he 
spoke and wrote in America. 

It is proper here for the author to acknowl- 
edge the kind interest which many friends 
have taken in the progress of his labor, by 
placing manuscripts and documents at his dis- 
posal. To my friend John Savage, who was, 
perhaps, Meagher's closest associate in social 
life for many years, and who was his editorial 
colleague when the Irish News was established, 
I am indebted for some valuable material care- 
fully preserved since its publication in 1849. 
There are others w^hose voluntary kindness 
should not be forgotten ; among them Mr. John 
McCrone of Washington, Mr. John T. Doran of 
St. Louis, and Mr. George Mellen of New York. 

With these prefatory remarks, the following 
selections from Meagher's speeches and writings 
are submitted to the reader. 



SPEECH 

ON THE TRANSPORTATIOX OF MITCHEL. 

1848. 



Citizens of Dublin — Since we last assembled 
in this Hall, an event has occurred which de- 
cides our fate. 

We are no longer masters of our lives. They 
belong to oiir country — to liberty — to vengeance. 
Upon the walls of Newgate a fettered hand has 
inscribed this destiny. We shall be the martyrs 
or the rulers of a revolution. 

" One, two, three — ay, hundreds shall follow 
me !" exclaimed the noble citizen who was sen- 
tenced to exile and immortality upon the morn- 
ing of the 29th of May. 

Such was his prophecy, and his children will 
live to say it has been fulfilled. 

Let no man mistrust these words. Whilst I 
speak them, I am fully sensible of the obliga- 
tion they impose. It is an obligation fi'om 



214 APPENDIX. 

which there is no exemption but through in- 
famy. 

Claiming your trust, however, I well know 
the feelings that prevail amongst you — doubt — 
depression — shame. Doubt, as to the truth of 
those Avhose advice restrained your daring. De- 
pression, inspired by the loss of the ablest and 
.the boldest man amongst us. Shame, excited 
by the ease, the insolence, the impunity with 
which he was hurried in chains from the island 
to whose service he had sacrificed all that he 
had on earth — all that made life dear, and hon- 
orable, and glorious to him — his home, his ge- 
nius, and his liberty. 

In those feelings of depression and shame I 
deeply share ; and from the mistrust with which 
some of you, at least, may regard the members 
of the late Council, I shall not hold myself ex- 
empt. If they are to blame, so am I. Between 
the hearts of the people and the bayonets of the 
government, I took my stand, with the members 
of the Council, and warned back the precipitate 
devotion wdiich scoffed at prudence as a crime. 
I am here to answer for that act. If you be- 
lieve it to have been the act of a dastard, treat 
me with no delicacy -^treat me with no respect. 



APPENDIX. 215 

Yindicate your courage in the impeachment of 
the coward. The necessities and perils of the 
cause forbid the interchange of courtesies. Ci- 
vilities are out of place in the whirl and tumult 
of the tempest. 

Do not fear that the forfeiture of your confi- 
dence will induce in me the renunciation of the 
cause. In the ranks — by the side of the poor- 
est mechanic — I shall proudly act, under any 
executive you may decree. Summon the intel- 
lect and heroism of the democracy, from the 
W'Orkshop, the field, the garret — bind the brow 
of labor with the crown of sovereignty — place 
the sceptre in the rough and blistered hand — 
and, to the death, I shall be the subject and the 
soldier of the plebeian king ! 

The address of the Council to the people of 
Ireland — the address signed b}' William Smith 
O'Brien — bears witness to your determination. 
It states that thousands of Confederates had 
pledged themselves that John Mitchel should 
not leave these ifehores but through their blood. 
We were bound to make this statement — bound 
in justice to you — bound in honor to the coun- 
try. Whatever odium may flow from that scene 
of victorious defiance, in which the government 



216 APPENDIX. 

played its part without a stammer or a check, 
none falls on you. You would have fought, had 
we not seized your hands, and bound them. 

Let no foul tongue, then, spit its sarcasms 
upon the people. They were ready for the 
sacrifice ; and had the word been given, the 
stars would burn this night above a thousand 
crimsoned graves. The guilt is ours — let the 
sarcasm fall upon our heads. 

We told you in the Clubs, four days previous 
to the trial, the reasons that compelled us to 
oppose the project of a rescue. The concentra- 
tion of 10,000 troops upon the city — the incom- 
plete organization of the people — the insuffi- 
ciency of food, in case of a sustained resistance 
— the uncertainty as to how far the country dis- 
tricts were prepared to support us — these were 
the chief reasons that forced us into an antago- 
nism with your generosity, your devotion, your 
intrepidity. Night after night we visited the 
Clubs, to know your sentiments, your determi- 
nation — and to the course we instructed you to 
adopt, you gave, at length, a reluctant sanction. 

Now, I do not think it would be candid in me 
to conceal the fact, that the day subsequent to 
the arrest of John Mitch el, I gave expression to 
sentiments having a tendency quite opposite to 



APPENDIX. 217 

the advice I have mentioned. At a meeting of 
the Grattan Club, I said that the Confederation 
ought to come to the resohition to resist bj 
force the transportation of John Mitchel, and 
if the Avorst befell us, the ship that carried him 
away should sail upon a sea of blood. 

I said this, and I shall not now conceal it. I 
said this, and I shall not shrink from the re- 
proach of having acted otherwise. 

Upon consideration, I became convinced they 
were sentiments which, if acted upon, would 
associate my name with the ruin of the cause. 
I felt it my duty, therefore, to retract them — 
not to disown, but to condemn them — not to 
shrink from the responsibility which the avowal 
of them might entail, but to avert the disaster 
which the enforcement of them would insure. 

You have now heard all I have to say on that 
point, and with a conscience happy in the 
thought that it has concealed nothing, I shall 
exultingly look forward to an event — the shadow 
of which already encompasses us — for the vin- 
dication of my conduct, and the attestation of 
my truth. 

Call me coward — call me renegade. I will 
accept these titles as the penalties which a fidel- 
ity to my convictions has imposed. It will be 



218 APPENDIX. 

SO for a short time only. To tlie end, I see the 
path I have been ordained to walk, and upon 
the grave which closes in that path, I can read 
no coward's epitaph. 

Bitterly, indeed, might the wife and children 
of our illustrious friend lament the loss they 
have sustained, if his example failed to excite 
amongst us that defiant spirit which, in spite of 
pains and penalties, will boldly soar to freedom, 
and from the dust, where it has fretted for a 
time, return in rapturous flight to the source 
from whence it came. Not till then — not till 
the cowardice of the country has been made 
manifest — let there be tears and mourning round 
that hearth, of which the pride and chivalry 
have passed away. 

I said, that in the depression which his loss 
inspired, I deeply shared. I should not have 
said so. I feel no depression. His example — 
his fortitude — his courage — forbid the feeling. 
All that was perishable in him — his flesh and 
blood — are in the keeping of the privileged fel- 
ons who won his liberty with their loaded dice. 
But his genius, his truth, his heroism — to what 
penal settlement have these immortal influences 
been condemned ? 

Oh ! to have checked the evil promptly— to 



'\ 



APPENDIX. 219 

have secured their crown and government 
against him and his teachings— to have done 
their treacherous business well — they should 
have read his mission and his power in the star 
which presided at his birth, and have stabbed 
him in his cradle. They seized him thirty years 
too late — they seized him when his steady hand 
had lit the sacred fire, and the flame had passed 
from soul to soul. 

Who speaks of depression, then ? 

Banish it ! Let not the banners droop— let 
not the battalions reel — when the young chief 
is down ! 

You have to avenge that fall. Until that fall 
shall have been avenged, a sin blackens the soul 
of the nation, and repels from our cause the 
sympathies of every gallant people. 

For one, I am pledged to follow him. Once 
again they shall have to pack their jury-box — 
once again, exhibit to the world the frauds and 
mockeries — the tricks and perjuries — upon 
which their power is based. In this island, the 
English never — never, shall have rest. The 
work, begun by the Norman, never shall be 
completed. 

Generation transmits to generation the holy 
passion which pants for liberty— which frets 



220 APPENDIX. 

against oppression. From the blood wliich 
drenched the scaffolds of 1798, the " felons" of 
this year have sprung. 

Should their blood flow — peace, and loyalty, 
and debasement may here, for a time, resume 
their reign — the snows of a winter, the flowers 
of a summer, may clothe the proscribed graves 
— but from those graves there shall hereafter be 
an armed resurrection. 

Peace, loyalty, and debasement, forsooth ! A 
stagnant society — breeding in its bosom slimy, 
sluggish things, which to the surface make their 
way by stealth, and there, for a season, creep, 
cringe, and glitter in the glare of a provincial 
royalty ! Peace, loyalty, and debasement ! A 
mass of pauperism — shovelled off the land, 
stocked in fever-sheds and poor-houses, shipped 
to Canadian swamps — rags, and pestilence, and 
vermin ! Behold the rule of England — and in 
that rule, behold humanity dethroned, and 
Providence blasphemed ! 

To keep up this abomination, they enact their 
laws of felony. To sweep away the abomina- 
tion, we must break through their laws. 

Should the laws fail, they will hedge in the 
abomination with their bayonets and their gib- 
bets. These, too, shall give way before the tor- 



APPENDIX. 221 

rent of fire which gathers in the soul of the 
people. The question so long debated — debated, 
years ago, on fields of blood — debated latterly 
in a venal senate, amid the jeers and yells of 
faction — the question, as to who shall be the 
owners of this island, must be this year deter- 
mined. The end is at hand, and so, unite and 
arm ! 

A truce to cheers — to speeches — to banquets 
— to "important resolutions" that resolve noth- 
ing, and " magnificent displays," that are little 
else than preposterous deceptions. Ascertain 
your resources in each locality — consolidate, ar- 
range them — substitute defined action for drift- 
less passion — and, in the intelligent distribution 
and disciplined exercise of your powers, let the 
mind of the country manifest its purpose, and 
give permanent effect to it& ambition. 

In carrying out this plan, the country shall 
have the services of the leading members of the 
Council, and from this great task — the organi- 
zation of the country — we shall not desist, until 
it has been thoroughly accomplished. When it 
is accomplished, the country shall resume its 
freedom and its sovereignty. To the work, 
then, with high hope and impassioned vigor ! 

There is, a black ship upon the southern sea 



222 APPENDIX. 

this night. Far from his own, old land — far 
from the sea, and soil, and sky, which, standing 
here, he used to claim for you with all the pride 
of a true Irish prince — far from that circle of 
fresh, young hearts, in whose light, and joyous- 
ness, and warmth his own drank in each even- 
ing new life and vigor — far from that young 
wife, in whose heart the kind hand of Heaven 
has kindled a gentle heroism — sustained by 
which she looks with serenity and pride upon 
her widowed house, and in the children that 
girdle her with beauty, beholds but the inherit- 
ors of a name which, to their last breath, will 
secure to them the love, the honor, the blessing 
of their countrj^ — far from these scenes and joj's, 
clothed and fettered as a felon, he is borne to 
an island, whereon the rich, and brilliant, and 
rapacious power of which he was the foe, has 
doomed him to a dark existence. That sentence 
must be reversed — reversed b}^ the decree of a 
nation, arrayed in arms and in glory ! 

Till then, in the love of the country, let the 
W'ife and children of the illustrious exile be 
shielded from adversity. 

True — when he stood before the judge, and 
with the voice and bearing of a Roman, told 
him, that three hundred were prepared to follow 



^ APPENDIX. 223 

him — true it is, that, at that moment, he spoke 
not of his home and children — he thought only 
of his country — and, to the honor of her sons, 
bequeathed the cause for which he was con- 
demned to suffer. But in that one thought, all 
other thoughts were embraced. Girt by the 
arms and banners of a free people, he saw his 
home secure — his wife joyous — his children 
prosperous and ennobled. 

This was the thought which forbade his heart 
to blench wdien he left these shores — this the 
thought which calls up to-night, as he sleeps 
within that prison-ship, dreams full of light and 
rapturous joy — this the thought which will 
lighten the drudgery, and reconcile his proud 
heart to the odious conditions of his exile. 

Think ! — oh, think ! of that exile — the hopes, 
the longings, which will grow each day more 
anxious and impatient ! 

Think !— oh, think ! of how, with throbbing 
heart and kindling eye, he will look out across 
the waters that imprison him, searching in the 
eastern sky for the flag that will announce to 
him his liberty, and the triumph of sedition ! 

Think ! — oh, think ! of that day, when thou- 
sands and tens of thousands will rash down to 
the water's edge, as a distant gun proclaims his 



224 APPENDIX. I 

return — mark the ship as it dashes through the 
■waves and nears the shore — behold him stand- 
ing there upon the deck — ^the same calm, intre- 
pid, noble heart — his clear, quick eye runs 
along the shore, and fills with the light which 
flashes from the bayonets of the people — a mo- 
ment's pause ! and then — amid the roar of can- 
non, the fluttering of a thousand flags, the 
pealing of the cathedral bells — the triumphant 
felon sets his foot once more upon his native 
soil — hailed, and blessed, and worshipped as 
the first citizen of our free and sovereign state ! ^ 




SPEECH 

01:^ AMERICAN BENEVOLENCE — IRISH 
GRATITUDE. 

Me. Chaieman and Gentlemen — I almost hes- 
itate to thank you for the high honor you have 
conferred upon me, in requesting me to speak 
to the health of the Ladies of America, for, in 
doing so, you have imposed upon me a very se- 
rious task. This I sincerely feel. 

Not, indeed, that this toast is suggestive of 
no inspiring incidents, but that the character of 
this assembly is such as to induce the fear, that 
I may clash with the opinions of some who are 
present here this evening, in giving full expres- 
sion to the feelings which the sentiment inspires. 

In this assembly, every political school has its 
teachers — every creed has its adherents — and I 
may safely say, that this banquet is the tribute 
of united Ireland to the representative of Amer- 
ican benevolence. 



226 APPENDIX. 

Being such, I am at once reminded of tlie 
dinner which took place after the battle of Sar- 
atoga, at which Gates and Burgoyne — the rival 
soldiers — sat together. 

Strange scene ! Ireland, the beaten and the 
bankrupt, entertains America, the victorious and 
the prosperous! 

Stranger still ! The flag of the Victor deco- 
rates this hall — decorates our harbor — not, in- 
deed, in triumph, but in sympathy — not to com- 
memorate the defeat, but to predict the resur- 
rection, of a fallen people ! 

One thing is certain — we are sincere upon 
this occasion. There is truth in this compli- 
ment. For the first time in her career, Ireland 
has reason to be grateful to a foreign power. 

Foreign power, sir ! Why should I designate 
that country a "foreign power," which has 
proved itself our sister country ? 

England, they sometimes say, is our sister 
country. We deny the relationship — we dis- 
card it. We claim America as our sister, and 
claiming her as such, we have assembled here 
this night. 

Should a stranger, viewing this brilliant 
scene, inquire of me, why it is that, amid the 
desolation of this dav — whilst famine is in the 



APPENDIX. 227 

land — whilst the hearse plumes darken the sum- 
mer scenery of the island — whilst death sows 
his harvest, and the earth teems not with the 
seeds of life, but with the seeds of corruption — 
should he inquire of me, why it is, that, amid 
this desolation, we hold high festival, hang out 
our banners, and thus carouse — I should reply, 
" Sir, the citizens of Dublin have met to pay a 
compliment to a plain citizen of America, which 
they would not pay — ' no, not for all the gold in 
Venice' — to the minister of England." 

Pursuing his inquiries, should he ask, why is 
this ? I should reply, " Sir, there is a country 
lying beneath that crimson canopy on which we 
gaze in these bright evenings — a country exult- 
ing in a vigorous and victorious youth — a coun- 
try with which we are incorporated by no Union 
Act — a country from which we are separated, 
not by a little channel, but by a mighty ocean — 
and this distant country, finding that our island, 
after an affiliation for centuries wdth the most 
opulent kingdom on earth, has been plunged 
into the deepest excesses of destitution and 
^disease — and believing that those fine ships 
which, a few years since, were the avenging an- 
gels of freedom, and guarded its domain with a 
sword of fire, might be intrusted with a kindlier 



228 APPENDIX. 

mission, and be the messengers of life as they 
had been the messengers of death — guided not 
by the principles of political economy, but im- 
pelled by the holiest passions of humanity — ■ 
this young nation has come to our rescue, and 
thus we behold the eagle — which, by the banks 
of the Delaware, scared away the spoiler from 
its offspring — we behold this eagle speeding 
across the wave, to chase from the shores of Old 
Dunleary the vulture of the Famine. 

Sir, it is not that this is an assembly in which 
all religious sects and political schools associate 
— it is not that this is a festive occasion in 
which we forget our differences, and mingle our 
sympathies for a common country — it is not for 
these reasons that this assembly is so pleasing 
to me. 

I do not urge my opinions upon any one. I 
speak them freely, it is true, but I trust without 
offence. But I tell you, gentlemen, this assem- 
bly is pleasing to me, because it is instructive. 

Sir, in the presence of the American citizens, 
we are reminded by what means a nation may 
cease to be poor, and how it may become great. 
In the presence of the American citizens, we 
are taught, that a nation achieving its liberty 
acquires the power that enables it to be a 



APPENDIX. 229 

benefactor to the distressed communities of the 
earth. 

If the right of taxation had not been legally 
disputed in the village of Lexington — if the 
Stamp Act had not been constitutionally re- 
pealed on the plains of Saratoga — America 
would not nov\' possess the wealth out of which 
she relieves the indigence of Ireland. 

The toast, moreover, to which you have in- 
vited me to speak, dictates a noble lesson to 
this country. The ladies of America refused to 
wear English manufacture. The ladies of 
America refused to drink the tea that came 
taxed from England. If you honor these illus- 
trious ladies, imitate their virtue, and be their 
rivals in heroic citizenship. 

If their example be imitated here, I think the 
day will come when the Irish flag will be hailed 
in the port of Boston. But if, in the vicissi- 
tudes to which all nations are exposed, danger 
should fall upon the great Republic, and if the 
choice be made to us to desert or befriend the 
land of Washington and Franklin, I, for one, 
will prefer to be grateful to the Samaritan, 
rather than be loyal to the Levite. 



SPEECH 

AT THE MITCHEL BANQUET IN THE 
BROADWAY THEATRE, NEW YORK, 
JANUARY, 1854. 

I WAS one evening on the Ohio — an evening 
I shall not easily forget. The river had been 
swollen with recent rains. The current was 
passing qiiicklj', but with the placidity which 
reminded one of the old proverb, that " smooth 
water runs deep." It was early in May. The 
sky was pale. Thin clouds, with softened out- 
line and mingling gently with one another, were 
moving towards the north. There was some- 
thing in the air which, if not vivifying — if not 
genial — was quieting. It was such an evening 
that good hearts might have been touched with 
great tenderness, if not with mournfulness. 
Not with the mournfulness which comes from 
anguish and pervades our nature as if with the 
faint pulsation of a subsiding struggle, but with 
that mournfulness which accompanies the recol- 



APPENDIX. 231 

lection of liome, and is tempered and sweetened, 
and lit up with the love of old scenes and faces, 
and the hope of seeing them once more. From 
the various incidents that were going on in the 
boat about me, and the varying features of the 
scene through which we were gliding, I turned 
to one object, which, far more forcibly than the 
rest, attracted my attention. It was a sycamore 
tree — a noble-looking tree — noble in its propor- 
tions, noble in its profusion, noble in its promise. 
And the birds were in it, on its topmost branch- 
es, striking out their light wings, and uttering 
their quick notes of joy. Oh ! with what a 
sweet trill came forth the liquid song from that 
waving, sparkling foliage ; and how confident 
it made the looker-on, that the tree from which 
it gushed in a hundred mingling streams would 
stand, and flourish, and put forth its beauty, and 
rejoice in the fragrant breath of the summer, 
and stoutly defy the shock of the winter for 
many years to come ! It was a dream. I 
looked downwards — the roots were stripped. 
The earth had been loosened from them, and 
they glistened like bones — whitened, as they 
were, with the water which tumbled through 
them, and about them, and over them. One 
hold alone it seemed to have. But the sleep- 



232 APPENDIX. 

less element was busy upon that. Even whilst 
I looked, the mould slipped in flakes from the 
solitary stay which held the tree erect. And 
there it stood — full of vigor, full of beauty, full 
of festive life, full of promise, with the grave, 
perhaps a fathom deep, opened at its feet. The 
next flood — and the last link must give ! And 
down must come that lord of the forest, with 
all his honors, with all his strength, with all his 
mirth ; and the remorseless river shall toss him 
to the thick slime, and then fling him up again, 
tearing his tangled finery, and bruising and 
breaking his proud limbs — until, two thousand 
miles below, on some stagnant swamp, tired of 
the dead prey, the wild pursuer, chafed and 
foaming from the chase, shall cast a shapeless 
log ashore. " Such shall be the fate," I said, 
" of the European kings !" It is now summer 
with them. The sunbeams gild the domes in 
their palaces. The helmets, with the crimson 
manes, burn along those white lines, within 
which legions, countless as those of Xerxes, are 
encamped. Prayers are going on in a pavilion 
on the field. It is the camp near Olmutz. The 
golden lamps, and cross, and vases of the vo- 
tive altar, fill the air, like the branch of Aver- 
nus, with a yellow lustre ; and the silver trum- 



APPENDIX. 233 

pets, sounding the thanksgiving, flash their 
shadows on the purple curtains of the chapel. 
Elsewhere — I believe in Paris — bridal feasts are 
going on ; old cathedrals shake from vault to 
belfry with swelling organs, and surging choirs, 
and rolling drums, and clanging chimes ; and 
the sun, streaming through the painted win- 
dows, mingles its rays with the perfumed smoke 
of thuribles, and the colored haze of embroi- 
dered copes and chasubles, and pennons of silk, 
and flowers fresh with luscious fragrance. Beau- 
ty is clustered there in snowy vesture ; and the 
princes and warriors of the cities, bearded and 
plumed, are harnessed for the field ; and there 
are senators, and councillors of state, and grand 
almoners, and doctors of the law, and ministers 
of police, and other functionaries, assembled 
there likewise, in holiday costume. The market 
places, and the public squares, and all the pub- 
lic offices, are decked out with floral wreaths, 
and painted shields and pendent flags. And 
there are gay processions through the streets ; 
and market choruses ; and barges with carved 
and gilded prows, and silken awnings fringed 
and tasselled richly, and all laden with revehy, 
gliding up and down the river. The sun goes 
down, yet the sky is bright — brighter than at 



23-4 APPENDIX. 

noon. There is a broad avenue, walled on 
either side and arched with fire. There are 
fountains of fire, pillars of fire, temples of fire — 
"temples of immortality" they call them — 
arches of fire, pyramids of fire. The fable of 
the Phoenix is more than realized. Above that 
mass and maze of flame, an eagle, feathered 
with flames, spreads his gigantic wings, and 
mounts and expands, until tower, and dome, and 
obelisk are spanued. Visions of Arabian nights 
visit the earth again. The wealth and wonders 
of Nineveh are disentombed. The festival costs 
one million six hundred thousand francs. All 
done to order. It is summer with the kings. 
Aye ! summer with the kings. Bright leaves 
upon the tree, and life and song amongst them ; 
but death is at the root. The next flood, and 
the proud lord of the forest shall be uprooted, 
and the waters shall tear him away, and when 
they have stripped him of his finery, they shall 
fling him in upon the swamp to rot. Such 
shall be the fate of the European kings — Eu- 
ropean aristocrats — European despotisms. Who 
will lament it ? Who would avert it ? Let us 
see them, and what they have to say. They 
will lament it, and they would strive to avert it 
who say that " order is to be maintained." As- 



APPENDIX. 235 

cribing, thereby, to absolutism the credit of 
preserving order, and to republicanism imputing 
the iniquity of its violation. To republicanism 
imputing its violation ! For as the word " or- 
der" with them does signify, in truth, the con- 
servation of aristocratic and egotistic power, in 
like manner the w^ord " republicanism" is used 
by them to denote the subversion of society, 
morality, the arts of peace, all the precepts of 
religion, all the excellences, proprieties, and 
felicities of life. Order ! Republicanism ! They 
use the one to expound their paradise — they 
use the other to express the confusion, dark- 
ness, and agonies of the abyss. " Even so," 
said they in the Convention, " did the Tarquins 
call the Senate of Rome an assembly of brig- 
ands. Even so did the vassals of Porsenna 
regard Scaevola as a madman. Thus, according 
to the manifestoes of Xerxes, did Aristides 
plunder the treasury of Greece. Thus did Oc- 
tavius and Antony ordain — with their hands 
full of spoils and dyed with blood — that they 
alone should be deemed clement — alone just — 
alone virtuous." 

To resume — Order must be maintained ! Ab- 
solutism is order. Republicanism is chaos. So 
says the dictionary, published by royal appro- 



236 APPENDIX. 

bation, at Paris and Vienna — the corrected edi- 
tion, witli a new preface, by a late prisoner at 
Ham. It is compiled from the Greek version of 
the Bible, the original being for many years in 
the possession of the devout schismatic of Rus- 
sia. Order must be maintained ! The streets 
swept with lancers in white cloaks. The press 
set to work in manacles. The key of the public 
treasury given to a desperate spendthrift. The 
men wdio will not break their oaths must be 
shipped off to swamps teeming with pestilence. 
The men who will not surrender the charter 
they have sworn to defend, must be lashed to- 
gether and shot down in bales. A swarm of 
spies must be let loose, like locusts, through the 
land. There must be a thief, with a note-book, 
commissioned to every house. The national 
sovereignty was not inviolable. Neither shall 
the household gods, with their traditional sanc- 
tities, love-gifts, and worship. Menace, terrify, 
paralyze the people, and, with a soldier at the 
ballot-box, call upon them to exercise the fran- 
chise. Legitimize infamy. Proscribe posteri- 
ty. Pronounce that it shall be born dumb. 
Erect a throne on the suffrage of seven millions. 
Boast that it is erected by the people ; and 
then, to prove your magnanimous submission to 



APPENDIX. 237 

the national will — liow dutifully you respect, 
Low profoundly you reverence, how sincerely 
3^ou regard it as the source of all legitimate au- 
thority — declare that it shall speak, that it shall 
act no more. 

Nominate the inheritors to the throne. Cir- 
cumscribe, arrest, annihilate the power to which 
you refer your crown and sceptre, by willing, 
declaring, and enacting that the gorgeous fur- 
niture, title, and trappings shall be irrevocable, 
and to 3'our furthest heirs transmissible. Do 
this. Do it boldly. Do ii without pause. Do 
it without scruple. Do it without mercy for the 
living, without ^ny decency for the dead — heed- 
less of the past, indifferent to the future — de- 
spite the oath that binds you — reckless of the 
God who watches 3^ou ! Do it ! Do it with the 
hardened heart and the savage arm ! Do it ! 
Order must be maintained ! Order ! There is 
order in the hospital ; there is order in the poor- 
house ; there is order in the jail. Order ! There 
is order in the mine, where men, and women, 
and children drudge like cattle — where the 
breath of morning never comes, and the sun 
shall never shine. Order ! There is order in 
the vaults, where the dead have been stored, 
and the terrible silence is broken only by the 



238 APPENDIX. 

scrambling of the vermin, or the thick moisture 
trickling down the arches on the coffin-lids and 
pavement. Order ! There is order in the des- 
ert, where no brown brook tumbles, and no ver- 
dure drinks the dew at sunset. Out upon such 
order. It is insensibilit}-, decay, desolation. It 
is sterility — stagnation — death. Life is to be a 
labor — life is to be a struggle — life is to be a 
warfare. Such the necessity of man — such the 
ordination of Providence. In the material 
world — in that world which men call inanimate 
— the operation of this law to the least thought- 
ful is ever visible. Behold the forest ! — it never 
slumbers ; each day chronicles within it a fresh 
growth. Behold the sea ! — it is in motion ever ; 
if it ebbs, it flows again, replenishing the waste 
from which for an interval it retired. And thus 
it is, and has been, and must be, with the vitality 
of nations — ever active, recuperative, progres- 
sive. Such the law. Where this law is in force 
there is health and beaut}^ and great glory, and 
vast advantages. Where the law is checked, 
there is decrepitude, deeay, bitterness, imbecili- 
ty, corruption. Look to Austria — look to Amer- 
ica. Look to Italy — look to America. Look to 
Russia, with her territory, traditions, fanati- 
cisms, millions. Place her beside America. 



APPENDIX. 239 

Who will have the temerity to say she stands 
the competition ? And why? Because the vi- 
tality of the one is the vitality of freedom. Be- 
cause the vitality of the other is no more than 
that with which an enormous mechanism may 
be cunningly endowed. The one is the original 
soul ; the other but the temporary impulse. I 
shall not go into histor}^ to substantiate these 
views. When a nation is free, the nation is ac- 
tive, adventurous, occupied with great projects, 
competent to achieve great ends. When a na- 
tion is enslaved, she is spiritless, inert, and 
sluggish ; is stirred by no proud conception ; 
her strength enervated, she is unequal to an in- 
dustrious career. The most prosperous days 
which nations have enjoyed have been those in 
which their freedom was most conspicuous. 
More than this : the consciousness of freedom 
endued them with a vigor which not only re- 
pelled but appalled their enemies. Prussia, 
when it was less than Portugal in population, 
encountered successfully the greatest of the Eu- 
ropean powers. Holland, with an area of a few 
thousand square miles only, and resources in 
proportion, bore up against the empire of Spain 
when Spain had at her command the mines of 
the New World and the chivalry of the Old. 



240 APPENDIX. 

Switzerland, without a colony, without an ally, 
without a gun upon the seas, stands secure in 
the midst of foes — a citadel of freedom impreg- 
nable as the Alps. Carthage reckoned more 
years than the Macedonian States ; Venice had 
a longer pedigree than kingly France. 

Where, in such a condition of life, are the 
activities of the mind, the grand passions of the 
heart, the adventurous purposes of the soul? 
Where, as we find them here, are the noble 
sympathies which link one nation to another — 
link them together in adversity, in victory, in 
affluence, in ruin, in martyrdom, in conquest? 
Where the expansive fire of intellect, which, 
fed by the sages and poets, by the sculptors and 
painters and statesmen of the old republics, 
mounts to meet the beams of the sun, and, made 
glorious by the contact, distributes and commu- 
nicates itself to other lands — dispelling the 
shades of night, and quickening the spirits of 
those that are in captivity, and the darkness of 
bondage ? Where, as we find it here, is the in- 
trepid spirit which penetrates, reclaims, and 
populates the wilderness ; by which the valley 
is filled, and every mountain and hill brought 
low, and the crooked is made straight, and the 
rough ways made smooth ; before which the 



APPENDIX. 241 

reptile and the wild-man recede ; in whose 
breath the golden grain multiplies ; where the 
hawk, and the sour weed, and the bittern have 
been ; at whose touch cities, wealthier than 
those the gates of which were of bronze, spring 
up ; at whose mandates fleets whiten the wil- 
derness of ocean, bury the harpoon in the snows 
of the north ; gather the fruits and shells of the 
coral islands, outstrip in capacity and speed the 
ships of the oldest commonwealths, knock at 
the gates of the Amazon and demand admit- 
tance, through regions of untold wealth, to the 
rampart of the Andes ; threaten the wooden 
w^alls of Austria, and from the muzzle of their 
murderous gun rescues the forlorn worshipper 
of freedom ; and, at last, consummate the mag- 
nificent design of the Genoese — breaking the 
mystic seal which has so long shut out the world 
from that empire which, we are told, is fragrant 
with the camphor, the cedar, and the laurel — 
than which China has not been so inscrutable 
nor India more opulent, nor Athens better 
skilled in the gentler sciences and arts ? 
11 




LECTURES IN CALIFORNIA. 



On the 24th of January, 1864, Meagher de- 
livered the following splendid and learned lec- 
ture in the Music Hall at San Francisco : 

^' Previous to my entering on that course of 
lectures which I propose delivering in your city, 
a few introductory words may not be out of 
season. I am the more inclined to speak them, 
since the welcome you have given me has been 
so cordial, and the interest evinced in rjiy regard 
has been so earnest. 

" To the coldest stranger, such words might 
be spoken with propriety and eifectt Where 
there are more friends than strangers round 
me, the propriety of my doing so becomes the 
more obvious ; and tlie effect, I anticipate, will 
be to knit more closely those ties which your 
hospitable spirit has so brightly woven, and 



APPENDIX. 243 

wbicli, like golden chords vibrating with genial 
melodies in a social circle, unite us at this mo- 
ment. 

" Of that course of events to which my pres- 
ence here this evening may be in the main as- 
cribed, by most people in this Bepublic the 
narrative has been read. On this account, it is 
unnecessary for me to recite it here. Besides, 
it is in great part a gloomy one, and the recital 
of it would be more likel}' to excite painful than 
pleasurable emotions. Let it be a sealed book, 
until some glowing hand, pulsating with a de- 
light almost delirious, shall open it to write 
therein, and at the foot of the last page, the 
imperishable word of ' Feeedom !' 

" In connection with it, however, let it suffice 
for me to say, that, with others who shared a 
common hope, calamity, and peril, I have been 
cast from a wreck upon these shores, and here, 
in this broad domain consecrated unto liberty 
with all the rites and sacrifices of a holy war, 
have I set down my household gods, and laid in 
hope the foundations of my future home. 

" It could not be expected that, from out of 
such vicissitudes ; having had to conspire 
against, to confront, and take issue with a for- 
midable government ; having had to undergo, 



244 APPENDIX. 

for four years, a dull, a deadening, an exhaust- 
ing isolation from all the scenes, pursuits, and 
duties of society ; having had to beat through 
the waves and winds of the two great oceans, 
and, through strange climes and visions, to gain 
this upper world, and clasp old friends, and 
breathe the vivifying air once more ; it could 
not be expected that from out of such vicissi- 
tudes I could emerge in a condition anywise 
more prosperous than that in which most men 
find themselves at last, who have been cast 
adrift on the sea of life, and been made the 
sport of fortune. Which being so, nothing re- 
mained for me but to set to work, and, so far as 
ni}' brains could creditably serve me, to do the 
best. 

"Hence I made up, with what materials my 
experience had gathered, and my memory re- 
tained, and with what workmanship it was in 
my capacity to bestow upon them, a box of tri- 
fling wares, and brought them with me into the 
country, there to sell them to the best advan- 
tage. This is the whole truth, and nothing but 
the truth, 

" Hence it is that I am here this night, in the 
land that is sown with gold ; a land which in 
my dreams I often thought might have been 



APPENDIX. 245 

once the site of cities like those of Tyre, and 
Nineveh, and Tarsus ; cities whose people were 
clothed in purple, and whose temples were in- 
laid with the cedar, the amethyst, and- pearl ; 
and that, having been buried, and the rugged 
growth of centuries having covered tliem, and 
their remains having slept for generations in 
desolation, you were conducted here, and were 
busy disinterring the fragments of palatial pil- 
lars, and broken sceptres, and the diadems of 
kings, and pieces of glittering armor, and piecea 
of chariots that had flashed in the sun through 
crowded streets, and cymbals that had sounded, 
and sacred fountains that had played their sil- 
ver showers, and chalices that had shone 
through the dusky silence of majestic shrines- 
dreamt ofteu that you were busy disinterring 
here the vestiges of a gorgeous creation, which 
a deluge of fire had sunk in shapeless ruin and 
inscrutable oblivion. 

" But even if the necessity of my disposing of 
these wares— these lectures — had been less ur- 
gent, I do not thiuk that it would have been 
less pardonable in me to make whatever use 
which, to a just extent were possible, of the 
faculties I may possess through the goodness 
of Heaven, and which, inconsiderable as they 



246 APPENDIX. 

ina}' be, were given, as all things on this earth 
are given, to promote some useful purpose. 

" In this Eepublic, no man is idle. Labor is 
the conspicuous order, instinct, passion of the 
day. Everywhere throughout this immense 
community ; everywhere upon this prodigious 
territory, within which so many families, races, 
nationalities, under a generous system of laws, 
are indissolubly blended — everywhere an irre- 
pressible vitality is evident. 

" In the forests of Maine, where the white 
flakes of the winter cling so long to the limbs 
of the pine, and the snow so long buries the 
green hope of the spring, and the breath of the 
North, even when summer has come, ripples the 
brown lake and river, and chafes the red lips of 
the fruit, and saddens the song that would other- 
wise hail with an exquisite ecstasy the birth of 
the flowers — even there that quick vitality is 
evident. 

" In the lowlands of Louisiana, where death 
accumulates his poison at the root of the sugar- 
cane, and the waters of the Mississippi devas- 
tate, in sudden inundations, the rich fields for 
miles, and the homesteads of the farmer, and 
the gardens of the planter, and the hot sun, 



APPENDIX. 24:7 

wliilst it generates those luscious clusters of 
vine and foliage, deadens our whole being with 
so deep a languor — there, too, that vitality is 
evident. 

*' In every quarter — no matter what the soil, 
no matter what the climate, no matter what the 
discouragement may be — a vigorous and ex- 
haustless industr}^ is visible. What it has 
achieved, need not be here described. What it 
is yet destined to achieve, I shall not venture to 
predict. Let that devolve upon one of the 
statesmen of the commonwealth to do. 

" For me, it is enough to say, that, sharing in 
some degree this active spirit ; inhaling it, as I 
do, the free air which lifts the folds of your in- 
violable flag; strengthened, exhilarated, stimu- 
lated by it, as I am by that consciousness of 
freedom, which touches, penetrates, gladdens, 
vivifies, endows with courage, and with a robust 
manhood invests, all those who settle here, and 
to citizenship aspire ; I have long since resolved 
to throw myself amongst the laborers ; and de- 
voting myself to the business for which I felt 
myself best fitted, to contribute my portion to 
that aggregate of enterprises and results, which,- 
even in her infancy, encompasses this empire 



248 APPENDIX. 

with so mucli opulence, and brings her out so 
prominently before the jealous audience of her 
contemporaries. 

" It matters little, if it matters anj^thing, 
what his influence may be — the man who idles 
here is regarded as an outcast. In other coun- 
tries — in countries where a territorial aristocra- 
cy preponderate, and the working-classes con- 
stitute little more than a servile power, by which 
the state is nourished, but which the state 
ignores; in such-like countries a man may wash 
his hands in costly kalydors, and from the dust 
and scars of labor, keep them, without reproof, 
immaculate. But here such exemptions, such 
conceits, such royalties, are at a discount. 
Here Labor is Nobility — here Democracy is 
sovereignty. 

" It is not the social aspect, but the intrinsic 
worth, which here obtains. It is not the con- 
dition of life, but the integrity and zeal with 
which life is made conducive to high ends, that 
here invite respect, win honor, command obedi- 
ence. It is the brain, and not the head-piece 
which covers it, tliat attracts and governs. It 
is the heart, and not the vest, the blouse, the 
flowing robe which hides it, that girdles itself 
with praises and with benedictions. It is not 



APPENDIX. 24:9 

the gilding nor the drapery ; nor yet its posi- 
tion in the temple, the saloon, the senate-house, 
which gather the multitude to the statue of the 
noted citizen ; kindle them into rapture as they 
gaze upon it ; and evoke, in presence of it, their 
anthems, their love, and reverence. It is the 
memory of good deeds done, clinging like a 
perfume to it ; the achievements of which it is 
the monument ; the immortal spirit which 
speaks from the marble, and plays in subtle 
sunlight on the consecrated brow. Behold 
here the spirit which actuates the Republic ; 
which through every portion of it distributes an 
activity so healthful, so adventurous, so intre- 
pid ; which into such magnitude develops its 
proportions ; and, even before they have been 
matured, illuminates its features with so bold a 
beauty ! 

" This activity, of which I have spoken, takes 
different shapes ; manifests itself in various 
ways ; in a variety of results makes itself more 
or less conspicuously known ; susceptible of 
positive interpretation ; worthy, in most in- 
stances, of the most creditable and joyful re- 
cognition. 

*' Some men build ships, which outstrip the 
swiftest messengers of the old world ; and 
11* 



250 APPENDIX. 

tlirough the lightnings, and the waves, and the 
winds ; and from islands sparkling with colored 
shells and fragrant with the gourd and bread- 
fruit ; or fi'om coasts inlaid with ivory and em- 
balmed with spices, but girt with deadly vapor; 
or from colossal cities whose age is made 
glorious with the traditions of the past and the 
conquests of modern science ; guide their home- 
ward flight to these shores — bearing in their 
broad bosoms burdens richer than the Spanish 
galleon or the Venetian argosy, in the plenitude 
of their prowess, ever before. These are the 
merchants of the Republic ! 

" Other men, axe in hand, cut their way 
through forests, where the tread of human foot 
never before has startled the reptile from his 
sleep amongst the thick shrubs and the dead 
and matted branches, and where unknown birds 
have for ages built their dusky nests in the 
depths of the impenetrable darkness ; and these 
brave men level the gaunt pillars of the forest, 
and let in upon the stagnant soil the vivifying 
light, and the sweet dews that trickle from the 
stars ; and they breast the river, from which 
none save the red- man and his wild kindred of 
the plain and thicket have drunk before ; and 
from crag to crag they climb, until they scare 



APPENDIX. 251 

the eagle from the topmost peak ; and from 
thence look down and out, far and wide, into a 
land of promise, through the shadowy valleys 
and glittering plains of which, deep waters, as 
they roll, reflect the clouds of a milder sky, and 
the dim coast-line of which, in the haze through 
which they look, sparkles with the rising and 
falling waves of an ocean they call — the great 
Pacific. These are the pioneers of the Be- 
public ! 

" Other men, again, spread their tents in 
pleasant places, where the rough work has been 
done before them ; the ground cleared ; the 
swamp drained ; the scrub thinned ; the rock 
uprooted ; the ponderous trunk laid low ; and 
there they feed the fresh earth with the yellow 
seed, and bid it conceive and bring forth fruit a 
hundred-fold ; and there they plant and dress 
the vine ; and there they set down the hivej-and 
with liquid violet, and thyme, and saffron-cups, 
invite the bees to swarm ; and the green marsh- 
es, and soft slopes, and the shaded hills are fra- 
grant with the breath and musical with the bells 
of gentle ramblers. Behold the simple children 
of the Eepublic ! Men like those who dwelt 
amongst the Arcadian oaks, or drank the nectar 
of Hymettus, or fed on herbs amongst the 



252 APPENDIX. 

rough fleeces on the summits of LycsDus, or 
those who, near the plains of Enna, dyed the 
fountain with the blood of oxen, and lit their 
torches in honor of the daughter of Yesta ! 

" To those who betake themselves to the 
study of the laws and constitution of the Re- 
public ; who, through ' patient search and vigil 
long,' make themselves familiar with the history 
of the country, expert in estimating its re- 
sources, calculating its expansive force, and 
predicting what the progress, the acquisition, 
the future of the commonwealth will be — to such 
men, I need not, in this place, at this time, 
allude. It is known, wherever the name of 
America has been syllabled, that such men, in 
goodly profusion, have been here — that such 
men still exist, improve, and multiply. The old 
world, in her darkest hours, has been consoled, 
enlightened, and encouraged by them. Her 
young sons have heard their precepts, and been 
instructed. They have heard their instigations, 
and in the struggle for the right have been in- 
cited. They have caught their lofty intonations, 
and even in defeat have been inspired. From 
their captivity and ruins, the children of Europe 
have beheld the glory of these names mingling 
with the effulgence which mounted from the 



APPENDIX. 253 

prosperous cities in which your great orators 
and statesmen dwelt, and though sinking under 
the most galling calamities which all that is 
most remorseless in human nature can inflict — 
they, through their prison bars beholding it, 
have been upheld by the sight of the growing 
constellation in the western sky ; and yet, and 
yet again ! their faith in 'the redemption of hu- 
manity has been sustained. A little while, and 
I may revert to them ; for their labors and their 
triumphs illustrate the theme on which, this 
evening, I have thought it fitting I should 
speak. 

" But there is another class of workmen in 
the Republic, to whom it is proper I should 
make an immediate reference ; for, without being 
guilty of much conceit, I may rank myself 
amongst them ; and, in speaking of them, I 
explain my own purpose and position. These 
are the public lecturers. 

" Chateaubriand, writing in his Memoirs of his 
visit to America, when George Washington was 
President, and lived in Philadelphia, ' in a small 
house with all the simplicity of an ancient 
Pvoman,' and where he showed the distinguished 
French nobleman ' a key taken from the Bastile,' 
— Chateaubriand, writing about this visit of his, 



254 APPENDIX. 

and mentioning these incidents, observes, that 
'strangers need not look in the United States 
for that which especially distinguishes man from 
the other beings in creation, and which consti- 
tutes his highest glory, and the ornament of his 
days. The American (he continues) has substi- 
tuded the practical art for intellectual culture. 
Thrown from different causes upon a desert soil, 
agriculture and commerce have necessarily en- 
gaged his whole attention. Before cultivating 
the taste (he concludes), it was necessary to pro- 
vide sustenance for the body ; before planting 
trees, it was necessary to cut them down, in 
order to clear the ground for tillage.' 

" Whether the accuracy of these remarks may 
be confirmed or disputed, it is, just now, beside 
the question to inquire. In any case, I do not 
consider myself competent to determine. But 
whatever may have been the progress of 
America in the higher departments of intel- 
lectual culture — at the period to which M. de 
Chateaubriand refers — there can be no second 
opinion regarding the success of the Republic, 
in those same dej^artments during the last half- 
century. 

"That success has been rapid, regular, brilliant. 
In a little time it has covered a great space. 



APPENDIX. 255 

With few hands to rear it, the imperishable 
monument of the mind has ascended, until now 
the hght which plays upon the summit is visible 
from the furthest shore. 

"Some great orator of the Republic mighthere 
enumerate the names which, in characters of in- 
effable splendor, are registered upon that shaft. 
It would be a theme for such a tongue as that 
which has grown cold in the clay of Marshfield. 
In a tone not less lofty, perhaps, than that in 
which, as he stood at the base of that mighty 
obelisk on Bunker Hill, he called forth the first 
martyrs of the Revolution and placed an immor- 
tal crown on the bleeding head of each, might 
he, if breathing on the earth this day, enume- 
rate the scholars, who in the varied walks of 
learning — profane and sacred eloquence, the 
more subtle sciences, the study of mechanics, 
in the pulpit, on the stage, searching the 
heavens for the story of the planets, or master- 
ing the law and method of the winds — have 
conquered for the Republic a glory not less 
luminous than that which consecrates the torn 
and withered relics of her wars, plays upon the 
white wings of her commerce, and compensates 
her sons as they explore the wilderness and sub- 
jugate the wildness of nature. 



256 APPEKDIX. 

*' Chateaubriand Lelield the Kepublic, when, 
like the snckhng of Alcmena, it had killed the 
serpents in its cradle. Before he died, the 
strong child had sprung into the noblest atti- 
tude and proportions. He had achieved the 
measure of the twelve labors. 

" He had not only strangled a lion, terrible 
as the Nemean : he had freed from the multi- 
plied plagues swamps not less deadly than 
those of Lerna ; he had tamed the savage chil- 
dren that ~ swept the boundless plain — fiery, 
swift, and sanguinary as the steeds of Diomedes. 
In coming here — here to those yellow sands — 
he had made himself master of a treasure more 
costly than the golden fruitage of the Hesper- 
ides. But like another divinity of the ancient 
times, he rests in his winged chariot, now that 
all these victories have been accomplished, 
grasping a burning torch — it is the torch of 
Liberty! — and on his forehead wearing a re- 
splendent star — the Hyperion star of Genius ! 
So stands the Eepublic at this day ! Citizens ! 
behold your country in the plenitude of her 
glory ! 

" In the presence of history, I shall not assert 
that the achievements of the Republic in the 
fields of literature and science transcend those 



APPENDIX. 257 

that are set down to the credit of older nations. 
On this subject I shall not offend the good 
sense of tjie community with any inordinate 
assumption. I shall not say that the Ilej)ublic 
has done more through the cultivated intellect 
of her sons and daughters, than England has 
done — more than Spain has done — more than 
Italy has accomplished — more than old Ger- 
many, with her deep thought, her intense logic, 
her high-toned sympathies, and the prodigious 
resources of her language, has with such stately 
grandeur and serenity achieved. 

" These countries, all of them, have gray 
hairs. The green garlands that bind them have 
been the growth of many a prosperous summer. 
The pedestals on which the veteran monarchs 
stand have been the workmanship of genera- 
tions. But the elders have listened to the 
youngest of the nations. Their hearts have 
been stirred with the fresh harmonies of the 
voice speaking to them from the shores of the 
New World. Their faces have shone with the 
light which fell upon them from that column, 
glowing with great names and memories, of 
which we have just spoken. 

" There is Cooper, whose tales of the red-men, 



2e58 APPENDIX. 

and the pioneers, and the soldiers of the Revo- 
lution, and the seamen who dashed your flag in 
through the rocks and breakers of the English 
coast, and cut it out again as gallantly, have 
been read as widely as the border lyrics and 
romances of the Laird of Abbotsford. There 
is the faithful memorialist of Rip Van Winkle — 
the kindly chronicler of the legends of the 
Sleepy Hollow — the historian of Columbus — 
the author of Astoria — whose utterances, in a 
common language, are as sweet as those of 
Goldsmith, and whose pictures of the Alliambra 
are glowing with the colors and sombre with the 
shadows of the adventures, the times, and 
architecture they perpetuate. There is Pres- 
cott, Bancroft, Bryant, Emerson — a multitudi- 
nous litany of bright names ! 

"But it is not possible to enumerate them 
all. The range of my excursion is too limited 
for me to light upon all those flowers, all those 
trees, ail those mountains, which springing, 
blossoming, towering into the azure light, have 
diversified the face of your broad history, 
beautified its aspect, drunk the ambrosial dews, 
caught the resplendent hues, and over seas, and 
streams, and islands, and crowded cities, and 
colossal continents, have diffused the tints, 



APPENDIX. 259 

the perfumes, the quickening influences of a 
higher, a purer, a more effulgent, a diviner 
region. 

" I am not speaking in detail ; am not speak- 
ing with the analytical minuteness of a botanist ; 
with the categorical consecutiveness of an ap- 
praiser. I have been impressed with the grand 
spectacle of the intellect of the country dis- 
closing itself amply, vividly, in a multiplicity of 
forms, in a profusion of beauties, in the midst 
of uncongenial circumstances — in what might 
be considered a primitive, or, at all events,, a 
transition state of society — in the midst of great 
solicitudes, enterprises, haste and tumult — and 
I give to you but the shadowy outline of the 
great impression wrought upon my mind. It 
would take a consummate artist to fill up the de- 
tails and impart the colors. 

" But nobly as the intellect of this country 
has made itself known in the higher ranges of 
art and knowledge, and widely diffused as the 
popular intelligence appears to be, yet, from the 
rugged, vehement, absorbing labors in which 
the people throughout the States are for the 
most part engaged, the observations of M. de 
Chateaubriand may, without any disparagement 
to the Republic, be still considered, in some 



260 APPENDIX. 

degree, correct and applicable. The practicable 
pursuits, as they are generally termed and 
understood, do supersede the intellectual cul- 
ture. It is no calumny to say so. Neither does 
it convey an ignominious imputation. The 
same is true of all new countries. 

" It was true of Rome, when the walls of 
Rome were walls of mud, and long after the 
summit of the Aventine was crowned with the 
regal castle. It was true of Athens for many 
years before her last hero sacrificed himself, to 
realize for his country the promise of the oracle, 
and the citizens were governed by leaders of 
their own election. It is true of that nation, 
which, in the lifetime of the youngest of us, has 
been baptized in the same waters that wash 
your sands, and which, endowed as you have 
been, even from the moment of her birth wears a 
golden circle, set with five stars, upon her infant 
brow. 

" Before cultivating the taste it is necessary 
to provide for the sustenance of the body. ' Be- 
fore we plant the trees,' writes the great French- 
man, ' it is necessary to cut them down in order 
to clear the ground for tillage.' When the 
strong foundations have been set, when the 
main walls have been raised, we may lift the 



APPENDIX. 261 

fluted pillars of the portico, and crown the 
structure with the frescoed architrave. First 
accumulate the means ; then dispense and ap- 
propriate. The wagon first — then the carriage. 
The leather leggings first — then, if you like, the 
newest fashions. This is the law of progress ; 
this the safe instinct of nations : this the prac- 
tical lesson of all history. Chateaubriand is 
right ! 

" But again, deeply as the people throughout 
the States are immersed in business — in trade, 
agriculture, mechanism, commerce — and slight- 
ly as they are enabled to addict themselves to 
the higher occupations of the mind, ■ there is 
amongst them a keen appetite, an intense avid- 
ity for intellectual pleasures. Hence it is you 
find every one in the railway-car or steamboat, 
with the new^spaper, the monthly magazine, the 
cheap edition of the latest novel ; hence it is 
that public speaking is so much in vogue ; hence 
it is that this profession of public lecturing pre- 
vails to so great an extent. When the people 
have little or no time to read for themselves, they 
come for an hour or so to hear read out the 
notes of those who have had the time to read, 
and whose tastes addict them, as their faculties 
adapt them, specially to that pursuit. 



262 APPENDIX. 

" It was thus, perhaps, that the system of pe- 
riodical reviews arose. People who could not 
afford, so far as either time or money were con- 
cerned, to make themselves familiar with an- 
cient, recent, or contemporaneous literature — 
with past or passing events — with the ruins of 
antiquity, or the discoveries, in various fields, 
which enrich the present day — found it feasible 
and profitable to hear what men, endowed with 
libraries and leisure, had to say, in a few pages, 
npon such subjects. The writer in the review 
collected, arranged, set forth in a striking light 
and form the principal materials, excellences, or 
defects of works, which, to be read, studied, an- 
alyzed by people generally, would entail great 
expense, and demand from them a larger ex- 
emption from other occupations than they might 
with facility afford. 

" The lecturer differs from the reviewer in 
this only — the one prints the results of his re- 
searches — the other speaks them out. The one 
communicates himself to the public through the 
eyes — the other through the ears. It would 
not be delicate, neither would it be easy for me 
to determine which of the two is the better 
mode of supplying information. Let me com- 
promise the matter — since it is the age of com- 



APPENDIX. 263 

promises — and say, it is well for us to be in the 
possession of both facilities. 

" This brings me to what may not be inappro- 
priately styled the programme of my business ; 
for I do not this evening enter upon any one 
particular subject of the series I propose to lec- 
ture on ; but having spoken so far respecting 
the capacity in which I here appear ; having 
alluded to the circumstances in which my visit 
to your city may be said, though somewhat re- 
motely, to have originated, and the circum- 
stances of the country which have legitimatized 
the duties I have undertaken to perform ; it re- 
mains for me to indicate the events and person- 
ages, which, to the best of my knowledge and 
ability, I desire to illustrate, and the spirit in 
which I shall regard them. 

" It is my intention, then, to give a few lec- 
tures on the lives, times, and characters of the 
Irish orators — Grattan, Curran, O'Connell, 
Shiel, and Sheridan. 

" These lectures will not be criticisms — I do 
not feel myself authorized to criticize such men. 
Conscious that I am, by many degrees, the in- 
ferior of the least of them, it would be an in- 
decorous presumption on my part to sit in 
judgment and pronounce upon them. Had I, 



264: APPENDIX. 

in the cause of liberty, services like theirs to 
point to ; victories such as they achieved proud- 
ly to recount ; honors such as they vvon to show ; 
even did I lack the ability to search and eluci- 
date their nature and their genius, I might be 
pardoned the vain attempt. 

" Sincerely speaking, then, I promise little. 
Each of the proposed lectures will be confined 
within the natural boundaries of a simple nar- 
rative. Here and there, however, reflections 
may grow out of them, and expand beyond the 
narrow limits. Here and there, perhaps, hopes 
may spring up, sorrows may arise, conjectures 
may escape, and thus the field may be diversi- 
fied, and the atmosphere about it changed and 
colored. 

" But I come to speak of those whose memo- 
ries are the inalienable inheritance of my poor 
country, and in the possession of which — even 
though she sits in desolation in ' tattered weeds,' 
and though * sharp misery has worn her to the 
bones' — a radiant pride tinges her pale cheek, 
and over her aching head rays of inextinguish- 
able glory congregate. I come to speak of those 
who, with the beauty, the intrepidity, the pdw- 
er of the intellect that dwelt within them, res- 
cued the country of my birth from the obscurity 



APPENDIX. 265 

and inanition to which the laws of evil men had 
doomed her, and which, having conquered for 
her intervals of felicity and freedom, left her 
with a history to which the coldest or the haugh- 
tiest of her sons will revert with love and pride, 
and on which the bitterest of her calumniators 
cannot meditate without respect. 

" It is well that the story of such men should 
be simply told. Their grand proportions need 
no cunning drapery. It would be worse than 
useless to gild the glowing marble. Like the 
statues in Evadne, each has a noble history ; and 
dead though they be, in their presence virtue 
grows strong, heroism kindles in the weakest, 
and the guilty stand abashed. 

"There is an old man— with stooped shoul- 
ders, long thin arms, tjie sparest figure, haggard 
face, lips firmly set, and an eye with the search- 
ing glance of an eagle — that is Henry Grat- 
tan ! 

" What of him ? He had a great cause — a 
great opportunity, a great genius. The inde- 
pendence of Ireland — the cause. The embar- 
rassment of England with her colonies — the 
opportunity. "With the magnitude of both, his 
genius was commensurate. He was equal to 
his^ friends — as he himself said of his great 



266 APPENDIX. 

rival, Harry Flood — and was more than equal 
to his foes. When he spoke, the infirmities and 
deformities of man disappeared in a blaze of 
glory. His eloquence was more than human. 
' It was a combination of cloud, whirlwind, and 
flame.' Nothing could resist it — nothing could 
approach it. It conquered all or distanced all. 
Like the archangel of Raphael, it was winged 
as well as armed. His intellect was most noble. 
His heart was not less divinely moulded. Never 
before did so much gentleness, so much benig- 
nity, so much sweetness, so much courage, so 
much force, unite in one poor frame. The 
brightest event of Irish history, is the great 
event of that great man's life. If it is the 
brightest, let us refer it to his genius, his spirit, 
his ambition. His love of country was intense. 
' He never would be satisfied so long as the 
meanest cottager in Ireland had a link of the 
British chain clanking to his rags.' Thus he 
spoke, moving the declaration of independence. 
The last time he appeared in the Irish Parlia- 
ment was at midnight. He had come from a 
sick-bed. They gave him leave to sit whilst he 
addressed the House. For a moment — for a 
moment — his agony forsook him. Men beheld 
before their eyes a sublime transfiguration. ' I 



APPENDIX. 267 

rose,' said he, ' with the rising fortunes of my 
country — I am willing to die with her expiring 
liberties.' Had he been at that hour inspired 
with the republicanism of Wolfe Tone, his ca- 
reer and glory would have been complete. 



JOHN PHILPOT CUKEAN. 

Immediately succeeding the previous lecture 
Meagher delivered another in the same Hall, 
on Curran, of which the following is a synopsis. 

*' Ruins, blossoms, sterility, vegetation, storms, 
silence, vitality, desolate repose — such the his- 
tory of Ireland — such the character of the 
people by whom that history has been written. 
Of that character John Philpot Curran is the 
fullest and truest expression. His endowments 
were manj^, and were great. His gentleness, 
exquisite sensibility, deep mournfalness — a 
mournfulness which no festivity, no triumph, 
could ever thoroughly dispel — his noble elo- 
quence, heroism, honesty — all in him were lov- 
able and great. Then the circumstances in 
which we find him so often, win us to him, and 
make us love him. Look at him in London, 



268 APPENDIX. 

wliere, as Harrj Grattan had clone before him, 
he is eating his way to the bar. There he is, 
without a friend — ' without one affectionate soul 
(the poor Httle fellow piteouslj^ ejaculated) in 
Avhom he could take friendly refuge from the 
rigors of his destiny.' What could one so sen- 
sitive, so miserable, so lonely, do ? Is not the 
road to fame and fortune too steep, too bleak, 
too rough, for that poor outcast child? We 
shall see, by and by. Yet, as if he hadn't 
enough on his own account to trouble him, 
look how lovingly he shares the sorrows of the 
poor French doctor, who had just lost his wife, 
and was nursing a little orphan on his knee. 
For himself, he cares not that he is a beggar ! 
But, for that poor father — for that poor sickly 
child — oh ! how the heart of the poor Irish lad 
beats, and how fondly he wishes he had some- 
thing, he had plenty, he had a fortune for them ! 
' Surely,' thus he meditates and moralizes, ' for 
such a purpose it is not sinful to wish for riches.' 
This sensibility accompanies him all through 
life, and so does that mournfulness and dejection 
of spirit. He tells Grattan, one day, it is his 
wish ' to go to Spain and borrow a beard, and 
turn monk.' Then Charles Phillips shows him 
to us in the decline of life, wandering about his 



APPENDIX. 269 

beautiful grounds at midnight, hopeless, weary, 
and sick at heart. And then, again, Thomas 
David pictures him weighed down by grief, in 
sickness and utter desolation of spirit, weeping 
over the fate of Ireland, beside the grave of his 
little daughter. A deep tone of sadness vibrates 
through all his life — through all his words. His 
flowers seem to have sprung from the soil 
where the dead are sleeping. His liveliest 
songs come out from the sad foliage of the yew 
and cypress. 

" Yet through all, and over all, there shines 
the light and is heard the voice of a genius 
most divine. Here Mr. Meagher alluded to the 
scenes and incidents of his birth, ascribing 
most of his grand picturesque traits to their 
influence. He was born in a town called New- 
market, in the parish of Clonfert, in the barony 
of Dahallo, in the county of Cork, in the 
province of Munster, in the kingdom of Ireland. 
There were babbling brooks, and moory uplands, 
and 'large lonely mountains,' and ruins of 
castles, and ruins of chapels, all about where he 
was born ; and his mother was stored with 
grand old traditions, and legends, and wild 
stories — stories of outlaw, and hero, and saint, 
and rapparee, and fairy. No wonder, then, that 



270 APPENDIX. 

through the golden atmosphere of his genius, 
there was ever floating' that pale mist, and that 
there were black and stormy clouds amongst the 
crimson, and violet, and purple masses, when 
the sunset came. But that sadness of his was 
lit up, ever and anon, with mirth and drollery. 
He jokes about his poverty — jokes about not 
having a shilling in his pocket — jokes about his 
seven shirts (all his wardrobe !j — and writes to 
his mother to say he ' wants only five more to 
make up the dozen' — ^jokes about having *a 
family for whom he had no dinner, and a land- 
lady for whom he had no rent.' That Irish 
heart ! That heart, proof against the worst 
disasters, conflicts the most worrying, defeats 
the most dismaying! Which, not onty, as 
Whiteside says, carries our people over fields of 
peril, and sustains them in their poverty and 
persecution, but sweetens the cup of misery 
they have, from father to son, been doomed to 
drink. The lecturer then gave a minute and a 
most amusing description of the famous ' Monks 
of the Screw' — a convivial club (composed of 
the best and noblest spirits of the time), of 
which John Philpot Curran was the worthy 
Prior. At the table of the Monastery, in Kevin 
street, in the city of Dublin, he showed the 



APPENDIX. 271 

assembled brotherhood ' in their skull-capS; drab 
cloth gowns, hempen girdles, and the blessed 
spoon and cork-screw dangling by their sides.' 
Dean Kirwan, Chief Justice Burke, Hutchinson, 
(Provost of the University of Dublin), Henry 
Grattan, Lord Avonmore (Chief Baron of the 
Exchequer), and many more of the brightest 
and loftiest intellects of the period, belonged to 
the grotesque and jovial order. But Curran 
■svas the master spirit. They did right to conse- 
crate him Abbot of the order and ruler of the 
feast. His profuse, exuberant, exhaustless wit 
qualified him for the post. Of that wit the 
whole w^orld has heard. Every one, in fact, has 
a specimen of it, and wears it in a locket, as it 
were, of Wicklow gold set in Irish diamonds, as 
a charm against the heartache and the ' blue 
devils,' though their name were ' legion.' Mr. 
Meagher, however, repeated a number of the 
humorsome sayings of Curran, and several 
humorsome anecdotes told of the great orator, 
saying in reference to him and his rich, racy 
wit, ' that the darkest river will ripple and laugh, 
and sparkle sometimes — ay ! even when it is 
nearing the fathomless solitude in which it dis- 
appears forever !' But Curran had something 
more than wit ; something more than genius ; 



272 APPENDIX. 

something more than a genial, generous, loving 
nature. He had an unconquerable, defiant 
courage. For the crown, the bench, the castle, 
the yeomanry — for all the auxiliaries and ap- 
pliances of the tyranny of the day — he had a 
spirit that could confront, repel, and defy. For 
the wealthiest, boldest, most desperate criminal 
of them, he had a blow which made them reel, 
and the mark of which they bore with them to 
the grave. 

"The lecturer here entered into a most 
graphic and effective picture of the times — those 
that immediately succeeded 1798. 'Dublin 
(said Mr. Meagher) under Cornwallis, suppress- 
ing an insurrection, was a sight more terrible 
than Paris, under Robespierre, completing a 
revolution.' Curran's conduct and bearing, all 
through those terrible times, was most noble. 
Lord Clarendon hinted to him that he might 
lose his silk gown (which he wore as one of the 
king's counsel) for daring to appear in defence 
of the 'United Irishmen.' 'Well,' replied 
Curran, ' his Majesty may take the silk, but he 
will have to leave the stuff behind.' Ireland 
should never forget Curran. He was true to 
her to the last. The night the Irish Parliament 
was dissolved, he was standing, wrapped up in a 



APPENDIX. 273 

large cloak, close to one of the great pillars of 
the portico. One of the United Irishmen was 
passing near him ; Curran seized him by the 
arm, and looking him wildly and fiercely in the 
face, asked him, ' Where are now your 300,000 
armed men ?' The echo of the voice has not 
yet died in Ireland!" 



CATHOLICISM AND EEPUBLICANISM. 

Upon the question of the compatibility of 
the Roman Catholic faith with the principles of 
Eepublicanism, Meagher took occasion to ex- 
press his views in a lecture delivered in San 
Francisco in 1854, during the course which he 
had then entered upon. 

On this occasion he said : — 

" There are some men not to be argued with. 
For there are some men who cashier honesty as 
a folly, and addict themselves incorrigibly to 
the subtleties of logic and the ambiguities of 
language. They speak of 'religion,' when in 
their inmost hearts they mean ' despotism.' 
They speak of ' insubordination,' ' turbulence,' 
12* 



274 APPENDIX. 

* licentiousness,' — when it is the sagacious spirit 
of liberty which interrogates them, disputes 
their position, and advances to dislodge them. 
They speak of ' Atheism,' when it is the ' Truth' 
operating through the intellect which confronts 
them, and the awakened dupes cry aloud that 
they see no sanctity in servitude, no virtue with- 
out manhood, no humanity without intelligence, 
no worship of living creatures without a convic- 
tion of their worth. With such men I shall not 
argue ; with such men argument is impractica- 
ble ; with such men, the world over, it is their 
nature obstinately to reject the Right, as it is 
their interest cunningly to coalesce with and 
conspicuously represent the Wrong. They 
move in another orbit. Their motion for all 
time is determined — their destiny immutable. 
Farewell to Lucifer ! But there are some few 
honest men who will say, that ' religion' with 
' republicanism' is incompatible. With them I 
desire to speak. The rectitude of their hearts 
will reject the sophistry of the schools. Over 
their cherished prejudices their honest intelli- 
gence will predominate. Once stationed in pres- 
ence of the truth, they will recognize it with 
gladness, and publish it without trepidation. 
And who are these honest men who say that 



APPENDIX. 275 

* religion' with ' republicanism' is incompatible ? 
For the most part, they come from the country 
in which I had my birth ; they profess the reli- 
gious faith I myself profess. They are Irish- 
men and they are Roman Catholics. Their 
doctrine of incompatibility — the incompatibility 
of religion with republicanism or republicanism 
with religion — applies for the time being exclu- 
sively to Europe — applies to Ital}^, Germany, 
Sicily, France. From any application to this 
country it is scrupulously — and I believe, in the 
majority of instances, it is heartily — excluded. 

"As to Ireland, I know not if the proposition 
to which I allude has any peremptory reference. 
If not, it is well. If otherwise — if the ' au- 
thorities' upon such matters do not design re- 
publicanism for Ireland, but contemplate some 
shapeless scheme of independence — some 
scheme w^hich shall disturb and not remodel — 
shall be nothing more than a vague expression 
of restless aspirations — shall be nothing more 
than a waste and demolition — active with noth- 
ing but disorder, and defined only so far as ruin 
can be accounted a definition. If so, permit 
me in refutation of this difficulty on the score of 
religion, to plead for republicanism in Ireland. 
In a word, let me include my country in the sis- 



276 APPENDIX. 

terhood of Europe, and, pleading for one, let 
me plead for all. In doing so, it will be borne 
in mind, that when I speak of ' religion' I refer 
specially to Eoman Catholicity — for it has been 
in the name of Roman Catholicity alone that 
objections, on the score of religion, to the repub- 
licanism of Europe has been urged. What 
then are these objections ? Is rehgion safe only 
under the shadow of the bayonets ? Is the 
mitre unsafe without the crown above it ? Is 
the cross in danger unless the gibbet of the^ 
malefactor looms beside it? Must the cathe- 
dral have a camp, and the crozier be crossed or 
quartered with the sword? Is this the doc- 
trine? This what the Bible tells us? This 
what history teaches — what faith inspires? 
Is the caricature of the Duke of York (Com- 
mander-in-chief and Bishop Osnaburg) an ori- 
ginal by one of the oldest masters ? Is religion 
to be a mere master of the ceremonies to the 
military ball ? Dependent on the providence 
of a Prince — in peril when the people are 
supreme — guaranteed only when a ^^^igal^ond 
leaps upon the evacuated throne ? Such was 
not the teaching — such was not the experience 
of the first expounders of tlie Gospel. The 
Captain of the Temple and the Sadducees, and 



APPENDIX. 277 

Gamaliel, and the Doctors of the Law were 
against them ; yet it came to pass that many 
heard, and thousands were converted, though 
Herod sat upon a throne in royal apparel and 
made an oration to them. Is the patronage of 
the sceptre required ? Such was not the teach- 
ing — such was not the experience of the children 
of the Fishermen. They Avere driven to the 
dwellings of the dead — underneath the palaces 
of the emperors — driven where the funeral 
torches were quenched in vapor. But there w^as 
one torch which could not be extinguished — it 
was lit when the sun darkened over Calvary ! 
The circus flowed with blood, but the immortal 
spirit walked the red surge and foam, and led 
the sinking to eternal rest. Is, then, the patron- 
age of the sceptre required ? Such was not the 
teaching — such was not the experience of our 
heroic fathers. They were hunted as the wild 
fox was hunted. The cave was their cathedral. 
The crucifix on the rude chief ever admonished 
them of the penalty which awaited them. But 
the seed took root amongst the stones and 
thorns — ' it sprung beneath the axe and blos- 
somed in the blast.' Is, then, the patronage of 
the sceptre needed ? ^Essential, is it, to the 
stability of the Church against which, it was 



278 APPENDIX. 

promised, the gates of Hell should not prevail ! 
But it is well to liave the Church and State in- 
corporated ! Is this the proposition ? If so, 
we protest against any such identification. We 
forbid the banns. We do so out of our rever- 
ence for religion — we do so from our jealous 
watchfulness of freedom. I speak in the full 
spirit of the Constitution to which, upon the 
Gospel, I have pledged irrevocably my alle- 
giance ; which Constitution, in the first article 
of Amendments, declares that ' Congress shall 
make no law respecting an establishment of re- 
ligion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.' 
I speak in the broad spirit of the Signers of the 
Declaration, and in concurrence with the ex- 
pressed sentiments of the Eoman Catholic, Car- 
roll, of Carrollton. A friend of mine, Mr. Sam- 
uel Pierce, of Troy, in the State of New York, 
sent me, a few days previous to my leaving for 
this city, the copy of a letter written in 1827, by 
this memorable patriot. The letter is addressed 
to the Eev. John Stanford, Chaplain of the Hu- 
mane and Criminal Institutions in the city of 
New York. It is as follows : — 



APPENDIX. 279 

" ' DONGHORAGEN, Oct. 9th, 1837. 

" ' Keverend and Dear Sir : 

" ' I was yesterday favored with your friendly 
letter of the 10th past, and the discourses on 
the opening of the House of Refuge, and on 
the death of Jefferson and Adams. The former 
I have not yet read. With the latter I am high- 
ly pleased, and I sincerely thank you for your 
pious wishes for my happiness in the life to come. 

" ' Your sentiments on religious liberty coin- 
cide entirely with mine. To obtain religious as 
well as civil liberty, I entered zealously into the 
revolution, and observing the Christian religion 
divided into many sects, I founded the hope 
that no one would be so predominant as to be- 
come the religion of the State. That hope was 
thus early entertained, because all of them 
joined in the same cause with few exceptions of 
individuals. God grant that this religious lib- 
erty may be preserved in these States to the 
end of time, and that all believing in the reli- 
gion of Christ may practise the leading princi- 
ple of Charity, the basis of every virtue. 

" ' I remain, with great respect, Eeverend Sir, 
your most humble servant, 

" ' Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, 

" ' In the 91st year of his age.' 



280 APPENDIX. 

" Glorious old man ! Even to the setting of 
the sun, faithful to the principles which gave 
splendor to the morning of his life. Closing 
that letter, and having noted down the number 
of his days, well might he have exclaimed, ' I 
have been faithful to the lessons of my youth, 
and in my old age have not departed from them.' 
In the full spirit, then, of your noble Constitu- 
tion, and in hearty concurrence with the words 
I have now quoted, I set my face against an 
alliance of Church and State — here and else- 
where — now and for all time. I protest against 
it for Belgium, if Belgium so wills it. I protest 
against it for Ireland, if Ireland so wills it. I 
protest against it for Home, if Home so wills it. 
Is this to be an infidel ? To maintain for these 
countries that religion is best served when dis- 
encumbered by temporalities and unconnected 
with the State — is this to claim for these coun- 
tries an exemption from the practices taught, 
the duties and responsibilities imposed by the 
testament of Christ? If this doctrine of the 
voluntary system — of thorough disconnection 
of Church from State, and State from Church — ■ 
be good and orthodox in Ireland, why not in 
France? If good and orthodox in America, 
why not in Italy ? — why not in Home ? I speak 



APPENDIX. 281 

it plainly, so that there may be no mistake 
about it. I am opposed to the exercise in po- 
litical affairs of any and every clerical influence 
whatsoever ; and to the eradication of that in- 
fluence whenever it does operate in the secular 
organization of this or any other common- 
wealth, I would heartily contribute my stron- 
gest efforts. Speaking in this spirit — eager as I 
am to see these good principles carried out to 
their fullest extent, and in every instance — eager 
to see religion disencumbered of its temporali- 
ties and politics (by which I mean the science 
and practice of Government) relieved from ec- 
clesiastical control — speaking in this spirit, I 
raise my voice for the Eepublicanism of Rome. 
If the majority of the Roman citizens declare 
for a Republic, I pronounce emphatically for 
the deposition of the temporal power of the 
Pope. Let the Forum be rebuilt — let the Sen- 
ate and the Roman people resume their ancient 
rule ! Let the city of the Gracchi put on once 
more the civic crown ! Who upbraids me with 
apostasy in thus inciting exclamation in the w^ar 
of freedom ? Who ejaculates ' it is unholy ?' 
Does it involve a recantation of the faith in 
which I was baptized ? Livolve a repudiation 
of the teachings of the Fathers? Denial oi 



282 APPENDIX. 

tlie Sacraments? Irreverence of the Ceremo- 
nies? Infidelity — Impiety — Apostasy? What 
is it ? If it be a crime, let us have a definition 
— if it be a crime, let us have an exposition of 
it — the law, the logic, and the evidence. If it 
be a crime, I am guilty through excess of igno- 
rance — for neither in creed, nor gospel, nor the 
Fathers, have I discovered the verse, chapter, 
note, article, or passage, which forbids me, as a 
Roman Catholic, to claim for E-ome what it is 
lawful and highly righteous and creditable in me 
to claim for Sicily, for Sydney, for Mexico, or 
Moscow. Here, in this instance and at this day, I 
stand prepared to resist the temporal power of the 
Pope as strongly as it is more than probable I 
would have done had I lived in the days of Adri- 
an the Fourth, when, according to Augustine 
Thierry and others, his Holiness commissioned 
the Plantagenet to ' enter the kingdom of Ire- 
land, and there procure payment to the blessed 
Apostle Peter, of the annual tribute of one 
penny for each house.' Yes ! I raise my voice 
for the freedom of Rome — for its disenthrall- 
ment from that executive and policy which all 
intelligent and honest men concur in stigmatiz- 
ing as most ruinous — ruinous to the activity, 
the morality, the manhood, the attitude of the 



APPENDIX. 283 

people — and the most powerful repudiation of 
which is to be found in these wise and beneficent 
reforms which Pius the Ninth, on his accession 
to the pontifical throne, deemed it salutary and 
expedient to introduce. Yes ! I raise my voice 
for the freedom of Rome — for its resurrection 
from that decrepitude, that debasement, that 
ignominious inactivity, that debilitating repose, 
in which the noble city is held down by those 
fratricides of France, who with * Liberty, Equal- 
ity, and Fraternity' on their Tri-color, slew that 
younger brother of Republicanism, the smoke 
from whose altar was just ascending. Yes ! I 
raise my voice for the freedom of Rome — for its 
inauguration amongst those fortunate commu- 
nities of the earth, which, proceeding upon the 
simple precepts of republicanism, exhibit upon 
the broadest scale the capacities with which our 
being is endowed, and without any of the pa- 
geantry or mysticism which encircle royal estates, 
contribute, by their marvellous achievements in 
civilization, industrial art, and commerce, to the 
splendor of history and the happiness of hu- 
manity." 



EXTRACTS EROM 

HOLIDAYS IN COSTA RICA. 

BY THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 
[From Harper's Magazine.'] 



ENTRANCE TO COSTA RICA. 

The principal entrance at present into Costa 
Eica is from the Pacific, at Punta Arenas, in the 
Gulf of Nicoya. The Columbus, a deliberate 
old barque through which a screw has been 
thrust, brought us, early in March, 1858, from 
Panama to Punta Arenas in less than three 
days. 

The trip was delightful. The coast-range 
of Yeragua, the northernmost province of 
New Granada, was within sight — often within 
stone's-throw — the whole of the way. There 
were the mountains of the promontory of 
Azuero, glowing through the blue haze all day 
long. There were the rocks of Los Frailes — 



APPENDIX. 285 

gray rocks belted with sparkling breakers, in 
and out, and wide over the spray of which 
thousands of sea-birds sported — flashing in the 
sunset. There were the stars when the sun was 
gone — the white beach gleaming beyond the 
line of purpled waters — and here and there the 
fire of some lone hut in the forest high above 
the coast. At all times the sea was smooth — 
smooth as a lake in summer in the midst of 
warm wooded hills — and at noon it was won- 
drously beautiful and luminous ; so luminous 
that, looking down into its depths, one might 
have been wooed to fancy it had a floor of 
diamonds, and that the pink and yellow sea- 
flowers, loosened and floating upwards from it, 
bubbling as they rose, w^ere made of the finest 
gold. 

As for the company on board, ever so many 
nationalities, professions, phases of life and 
destinies, were comprehended in it. St. George 
had his champion in Mr. Perry — an affable, in- 
telligent, high-spirited young Englishman, who 
had just been gazetted to the British Yice- 
Consulate at Realejo, Nicaragua, and was on 
his way to Guatemala to receive his instructions 
from Mr. Wyke, the Consul-General. The 
Eagles of Napoleon were sentinelled by a vehe- 



286 APPENDIX. 

ment Frencliman — a short, hardy, wiry, flexible, 
swarthy fellow, in nankeen trowsers, glazed 
pumps, and Panama hat — who kept perpetually 
gliding up and down the deck, emphasizing his 
opinions on music, politics, and commerce to a 
lanky German with a pale mustache, who, as 
though he were condemned to it, limped the 
planks beside him. 

This Frenchman was singularly active, adven- 
turous, daring. He began life as a fisherman. 
From his cradle on one of the terraces of Brest, 
he was cast adrift into the fogs of Newfound- 
land, and there blossomed into manhood on 
grog and codfish. Slipping away from the 
Banks, he took to the world at large. He had 
been everywhere — been to the Antipodes — 
been to the Poles. With frogs and crocodiles, 
snake-charmers and ballet-girls, icebergs and 
palm-groves, he was equally familiar. Five 
years ago he found himself in the town of David, 
in the province of Veragua, two hundred miles 
above Panama ; and there, falling in love with 
a radiant Indian girl, whom he married at sight, 
concluded to settle. Since then it has fared 
well with him. 

His was, in truth, a golden wedding. It 
brought him herds, plantations, ships, vast 



APPENDIX. 287 

plains and forests. Some will have it that he is 
in secret possession of certain gold mines — a 
veritable El Dorado — in the mountains of the 
Isthmus. The day previous to our leaving it 
he arrived in Panama, fresh and lithe, after a 
ride from David of eighteen days through the 
wildest region. Raging rivers, too deep to ford, 
oftentimes broke his path. Into these, his 
clothes bundled up in a turban on his head, he 
had to plunge, and, battling across them, take 
his mule in tow. He was bound for San Jose, 
the capital of Costa Rica, as we ourselves 
were. 

Venezuela was somewhat disparagingly repre- 
sented by a tough and squalid merchant doing 
business in Panama. Importing silk-stuffs 
and ^^'ines, sardines and prunes, he is largely 
concerned in the pearl-fisheries of the Isla del 
Rey, and the other islands off the coast. His 
heart is as close as an oyster, and his face as 
expressionless and coarse as the shell. Guate- 
mala was more fortunate. Seiior Larraonda 
appeared for her. His figure and complexion 
do injustice to his liberality and graciousness. 
He is a tall, parched, sallow-faced gentleman, 
with a patch of gray whisker under each ear, 
and the fingers of a skeleton ; but those fingers 



288 APPENDIX. 

have clutched many a broad doubloon. A 
sugar-planter on the princeliest scale, his estate 
has yielded him $200,000 every season for the 
last four years. 

Close to the wheel-house, immediately after 
breakfast every morning, two priests invariably 
took their seats. Both were from Spain. The 
one was a Catalonian, the other an Aragonese. 
The Catalonian was a Capuchin. The Ara- 
gonese was a Jesuit. The Jesuit was the more 
remarkable of the two. 

He had a freckled face, a blood-shot eye, red 
beard and whiskers, a faded velvet skull-cap, 
threadbare soutcdne, and plain steel buckles in 
his sprawling shoes. But underneath that 
threadbare gown we are told there throbbed a 
zealous heart. Underneath that faded velvet 
skull-cap there glowed a fertile brain. The 
Jesuit was learned, eloquent, and pious. A 
profound Divine, a commanding Orator, an 
adventurous Soldier of the Cross, he, too, had 
seen most of the world. He had been to 
China, the Philippine Islands, Paraguay, Brazil. 
There was more than one on board whom his 
history had reached. His labors, his sacred 
rhetoric, his heroism in all those lands, had 
made him famous. 



APPENDIX. 289 

The morning of the third day out from Pana- 
ma, the Gulf of Nico^^a opened to admit us. 
Away to the left, Cape Blanco, the eastern pier 
of this great gate-way, glimmered through the 
mist. Away to the right, the volcano of Herra- 
dura, with the brown island of Cano sleeping in 
its shadow, stood as a watch-tower at the 
entrance. Farther up the Gulf, as the mist 
thinned off, the loftier mountains came forth and 
shone above the waters. There was ,the dome 
of San Pablo, with masses of white cloud rest- 
ing on it. There was the peak of the Aguacate 
quivering in the sun. Beyond, and high above 
them al], were the mountains of Dota, blendinsf 
— as though they were vapors only — with the 
deepening glory of the sky. All along the 
opposite shore, clusters of little islands — the 
Nigrites, San Lucas, and Pan Sucre — scrubby, 
barren islands, the roots of wdiich are rich in 
pearls — one by one peeped out and twinkled. 
In the mean while the breeze freshened and 
grew warm ; and the sea, broken into little 
hillocks, lisped and throbbed around us. At 
noon it was thronged and bustling. We were 
at our destination. -sf * * * 

13 



290 APPENDIX. 

THE FORESTS. 

The evening of the day following our arrival 
from Panama we set out for the mountains. An 
hour of brisk galloping, along the beach which 
connects the town of Punta Arenas with the 
main land, brought us to Chacarita, an outpost 
of the Custom-house at the Garita. It is here 
that all foreign goods, destined for any point 
between the port and the Garita, are subjected 
to inspection, are weighed, and paid for. The 
outpost consists of a spacious hut, built of bam- 
boo and wild sugar-cane, a banana-patch, and 
a poultry-yard. In the smoky interior of the 
hut, as we rode up to it, an Inspector of Cus- 
toms, with a stump of a pui^o between his placid 
lips, serenely oscillated in his shirt-sleeves in 
his hammock of agave straw. Having satisfied 
him that the blue California blankets strapped 
to our saddles contained a change of linen 
only, the calm Inspector, without rising from 
his hammock, with a gentle wave of his discol- 
ored hand, signified that we were at liberty to 
proceed. A moment after we were in the heart 
of the forest. 

Here, in all its varieties, we had the palm — 
the prince of the vegetable kingdom as Linnaeus 



APPENDIX. 291 

has called it — ever waving those plume-like 
branches which recall so many scenes of Scrip- 
tural beauty, festivity, and triumph-^so many 
scenes of hopefulness and succc5r in the desert 
and of life in the midst of death — and which, 
as many a carving and vivid painting on sacred 
walls attest, grew to be, in the red epochs of 
Christianity, the emblem of Martj^rdom for the 
Faith. Here was the ceiha, or the silk-cotton 
tree, the shaft of which swells to such a girth 
that the largest canoes are hewn out of it, while 
Sir Amyas Leigh, the romantic buccaneer, li- 
kens it to a light-house, so smooth and round 
and towering is it. Mj^riads of singing-birds 
build their nests in it, while from the topmost 
branches, to which they have climbed in search 
of light and air, the rose and yellow and red hig- 
nonias in luxuriant tresses and festoons uncoil 
themselves. Here was the matapcdo, or wild fig- 
tree, spreading out its long, tender, flexible stems 
over the surrounding trees in quest of some tem- 
porary support, and having found it, and grown 
strong enough to sustain itself, turning upon and 
killing its protector in its serpent-like embraces. 
Here, too, were several species of the acacia, such 
as the guanacaste and saman, the delicate feath- 
ery foliage of which was interwoven and blended 



292 APPENDIX. 

with the orange-blossoms and the large lanceo- 
lated leaves of the cincona. And then we had 
the parasitical cactuses in endless varieties, with 
their pink and violet and cream-colored flowers, 
clustering the moss-covered columns of the for- 
est, and flooding the golden air with the richest 
fragrance. A deep, solemn, beauteous, yet ma- 
jestic forest — one of the vast cathedrals of Na- 
ture — one fashioned of materials, living, efflores- 
cent, fruitful, imperishable — imperishable, since 
they perpetually renew themselves — to which 
the gold of the Sacramento is but as the dust 
of the road, and the marbles of Carrara are but 
the types of death — one down through the com- 
plex aisles of which, as through no stained win- 
dow, however wonderful its magic, the light of 
Heaven, colored with a thousand intermediate 
hues by day and by night, and for all time, with 
an ever-varying infinitude of splendor, plays — 
one studded with pillars, spanned witli arches, 
such as neither Zwirner of Cologne nor Angelo 
of Rome, with all their genius, with all their 
power, with all the resources of which, with the 
patronage of kings and pontiffs, they were the 
masters, could rear, elaborate, nor so much as 
in their divinest dreams devise ! 

In the midst of all this — winding through the 



APPENDIX. 293 

mazes of this superb labyrinth — hundreds of 
carts, in the months of February and March, 
move down. The noble oxen have their fore- 
heads shaded with the broad shining leaves of 
the pcwel. They come from Cartago, from San 
Jose, from the great plantation of Pacifica, in 
the valley of the Tiribi, in the shadow of the 
mountains of San Miguel^-from the plateaiixhe- 
yond the ruins of Ujarras, and overlooking the 
cataracts of the wild Berbis — descend four 
thousand feet into this forest, and so wend their 
way to Punta Arenas, at which port — with the 
exception of a few bags which find their way to 
the Serapiqui, and thence to the Atlantic — the 
entire coffee crop of Costa Rica is shipped to 
Europe and the United States. 

•3f • -H- 4<- -Jf -Jf 

TO SAN JOSE. 

An hour after dawn we were in our saddles, 
on the high road to San Jose once more. 

Having passed the Puente de las Damas — a 
bridge of massive masonry, spanning with a 
single arch, at an aching height, the black waters 
of the Jesus Maria, which here reel on through 
a chasm, from the crevices in the mighty walls 
of which the glossiest laurels and other shrubs 
spring forth in sparkling clusters— and having 



294 APPENDIX. 

ambled or g«alloped all the morning through the 
forest, we came at last to the venta, or road-side 
inn, of San Mateo. Anselmo, our guide, was 
there before us, for we had loitered at the farm 
of Las Ramadas to have a chat with a gipsy 
group at breakfast under a magnificent giiapa- 
nol, the thickly-leaved limbs of which on every 
side extended full forty feet above the camping- 
ground. 

Anselmo was a silent boy of Indian blood. 
His broad face, deeply punctured with the small- 
pox, was the color of a ripe walnut, while the 
expression of it was meditative and morose. He 
wore white check trowsers, a brown scapular, 
and a pink check shirt. His bare heels displayed 
a pair of spurs the rowels of which were the 
size and shape of a star-fish. Sauntering along — 
equally insensible to the dust, the beauty, the 
red mud, or the straining steepness of the road 
— with one of our fowling-pieces slung behind 
him, and some few necessary articles of toilet 
tied up in a coffee-bag before him — Anselmo, 
dispensing with stockings, held on with his toes 
to the stirrups. The most of the way he kept 
in the rear. The pilot of the party, he sat in the 
stern and steered from behind. It is the custom 



APPENDIX. 295 

of the country. The guide is seldom in advance 
— often out of sight — never within hail. 

Under the dome-like mangos — under the cool- 
est and darkest of them — Anselmo relieved the 
mules of their girths and cruppers, and gave 
them water, corn, and sacate. The room in 
which we breakfasted, floored with baked clay 
— clay done to brittle crust — was Avainscoted 
with cedar. This sounds fine. But cedar is 
cheap in Costa E-ica, and in such houses as the 
venta of San Mateo displays no polish. The 
breakfast consisted of fresh eggs, fresh bullock's 
tongue, a cup of sour coffee, a saucerful of ja- 
cotes or hog-plums, and the usual amount of 
tortillas J the ubiquitous slap-jacks of South and 
Central America. We were joined at table by 
an officer of the Costa Rican iiTm.y. He was on 
his way from Nicaragua to San Jose with dis- 
patches to his Government; the San Carlos — 
one of the steamboats taken from the Filibus- 
ters, and flying the Costa Rican flag on Lake 
Nicaragua— having thumped ashore and there 
stuck fast. He had come by the Guanacaste 
road, and to this point had been eight days in 
the saddle. He was a modest, intelligent, deli- 
cately-whiskered, mild, fair-faced gentleman. 



296 APPENDIX. 

Eminently gallant, too, for he had fought at 
Rivas, at Masaj-a, at San Jorge — all through 
the war in Nicaragua — and at its close had 
been honored with the command of the troops 
on board the steamboat which had just been 
wrecked. Over. his right shoulder was slung a 
broad green worsted belt. To this a tin canteen 
was hooked. Underneath the belt was his blue 
frock-coat. The coat stood in need of a good 
scouring. His sword, jingling in a steel scab- 
bard at his heels, would have been all the bright- 
er for a little sweet-oil and brick-dust. Having 
hastened with his breakfast and lit his purOj he 
mounted his white mule with the gay grandeur 
of a cavalier, gracefully lifted his drab sombrero, 
dashed through the gatewa}^ and disappeared 
up the mountain. Up the mountain ! For the 
shadow of the Aguacate was upon us. High as 
we were amidst the mangos on the ridge of San 
Mateo, this noble mountain stood, four thousand 
feet erect, between us and the sun. 

Haughty, opulent, superb — ravines and val- 
leys, two thousand feet in depth, are, to its glow- 
ing, but dim crevices at its foot, while the forest 
we have spoken of — that between Ghacarita and 
the Barranca — seems no more than a quiet shrub- 
bery, blossoming and sleeping in a silvered mist ! 



APPENDIX. 297 

Haughty, opulent, superb — it is an enormous 
mass of gold and silver — " the very dust which 
our horses spurned with their hoofs," so John 
L. Stepliens writes, " contains that treasure for 
which man forsakes kindred, home, and country.'* 
It has made the fortune of more than one bold 
speculator ; has made millionaires of such men 
as Espinac of Cartago, and Montealegre of San 
Jose ; still, still invites the capitalists of this and 
other countries ; and to the invincible hand of 
science knocking at its jDortals, and with the in- 
fallible torch, that has already divulged so many 
of the mysteries of nature, penetrating >its re- 
cesses, promises an exhaustless issue of incal- 
culable worth ! Haughty, opulent, superb — 
from base to summit it is an aggregation of most 
of the riches, the wonders, the terrors, the sweet- 
ness, and the glory of the earth! 

The tropical summer and the spring of the 
temperate zone equally divide the imperial 
mountain, and reign there perpetually — the one 
below, the other above. Each has its attendant 
flowers, trees, birds, reptiles; each its own wild 
offspring ; each its appropriate harmonies and 
treasures. The white eagle makes it its home ; 
the wild coffee fills it with its soft exquisite per- 
fume ; the cedars crowning it vibrate with the 



298 APPENDIX. 

merry peal of tlie bell-bird ; monkeys in legions 
swing themselves down upon the wild cacao to 
which its warmer slopes give birth ; serpents, 
such as the sahanera, twenty and thirty feet in 
length, glisten through the gloom of its thickets ; 
the sleek tiger enjoys the dumb security its vine- 
woven fastnesses afford ; humming-birds in mil- 
lions — " those fragments of the rainbow," as Au- 
dubon has called them — flash and whirr through 
the foliage ; while the King of the Yultures, with 
his gorgeous black and orange-colored crest — an 
acknowledged chief among the greediest pirates 
of the^dead — owns his oaken palace there, and 
soars above them all ! 

Midway up this mountain, at a point called 
desmonte, looking suddenly back over the road 
we had come, there broke upon us a vision of 
indescribable peacefulness and grandeur. The 
Gulf of Nicoya — a silver cord stretched along 
the horizon — seemed to pulsate with an unheard 
melody ; while the ships we had left at Punta 
Arenas looked as though they were sea-birds 
clinging to it. Between the Gulf and the prom- 
ontory of Nicoya, a white unbroken range of 
clouds extended. Beyond this range were the 
dark purple mountains of the promontory. It 
was the funeral procession overlooking the bridal 



APrENDix. 299 

train. To the left, the mountains, which up to 
this had walled in the road, suddenly gave way, 
and a vast ravine abruptly opened. Across the 
head of this ravine rose a wall of yellowish- 
brown barren hills ; and beyond and far above 
them again, flinging off the white clouds which 
floated between it and the sun — the crown of 
glory it aspired to — at a height of 11,500 feet 
above the sea, towered the volcano of San Pablo ! 
This noble feature was never absent from the 
scene. As we entered the Gulf of Nicoya at the 
dawn of day, there it was, hailing us in tones 
of thunder, a Cyclopean warder at the gate. All 
day long, anlde-deep in blistering sand, or gasp- 
ing in some rude veranda, we looked up to it 
from Punta Arenas — that stifled city of a burn- 
ing plain — and we sighed for the winds and the 
rain that have long since cooled its fiery head, 
for it is an extinct volcano. Hardly had we left 
the red-tiled roofs, the little orange-groves, the 
palm-trees, and sweet htiertas of Esparza a mile 
behind, when, out of the midst of the morning, 
there came forth that ever-wakeful sentinel of 
the night, beautiful and mighty as when the 
darkness closed around him. All along the road 
to San Mateo, and far beyond it, we turned from 
the fences of erithrynay interlaced with cadus 



300 APPENDIX. 

and wild pineapple, and the sngar-fields and 
pasture grounds tliey enclose, and from the several 
incidents and varying features of the road ; from 
ox-teams burdened with coffee, as we had seen 
them in the forest the evening previous ; from 
spacious farm-houses with whitewashed walls 
and broad piazzas ; from loving couples snugly 
seated on the one tough saddle, the cahallero hold- 
ing the senorita before him on the pommel, a far 
pleasanter arrangement than that prevailing in 
older countries when the pillion was in fashion ; 
from droves of drowsy mules, laden with cacao in 
ox-hide bags, coming up from Nicaragua, whisk- 
ing their tails and jingling their bells as they 
plodded before their masters, whose salute, as we 
rode past them, was gracious and most winning ; 
from black-eyed groups at breakfast under some 
lofty carol), the black iron pot sending up its 
fragrant steam of boiling beans, the unyoked 
oxen munching the tops of sugar-canes outside 
the domestic circle, and scurvy dogs, at detached 
posts beyond the camp, showing their teeth, 
and snarling at the foreigners as they rode_by; 
from the tall rustic cross, planted on the spot 
where some deed of blood had been done, some 
criminal had been shot, or some one had sud- 
denly dropped dead ; from these, the several 



APPENDIX. 301 

incidents, and these, tlie varying features of the 
road, many and many a time, all along to San 
Mateo, and far beyond it, we turned to gaze 
upon San Pablo. And here at this point called 
Desmonte — from this commanding height — with 
this vast ravine below us, in which the Catskill 
might be buried, and with the intermediate 
range of lowlier mountains opening wide, so as 
to disclose it in its magnitude and the absolut- 
ism of its glory, San Pablo — the eternal sentinel 
of the Republic — overwhelmed all rivalry, and 
with a supreme sublimity usurped the conquered 
scene I * * ^ ^ 

INTRODUCTIONS. 

The letters of introduction we brought to the 
President, the Bishop of San Jose, the Minister 
of State, and other notable citizens of Costa 
Rica, obtained an unmolested passage for our 
luggage. It was on the road, miles behind us, 
jolting and smashing along in the rear of two 
ponderous bullocks ; but whenever it arrived, the 
Commandant at the Garita in the pleasantest 
accents assured us the formality of an inspec- 
tion would be dispensed with. It was due to 
literature and science, he said, that the luggage 
of gentlemen devoted to the pursuit of knowl- 



302 APPENDIX. 

edge shovild be exempt from the formalities to 
which Westphalian hams and such gross articles 
were subject. Moreover, it was due to the son 
of the illustrious General Paez. This he added 
with the most gallant courtesy, lifting his hat 
and bowing, his cavalry sword sliding away in 
the dust behind him as he did so. He did 
more. He was hospitable as he was gallant. 
Stepping into the Custom-house he brought 
out a bottle of cogniac, a tumbler, and a cork- 
screw. Without dismounting, we drank his 
health and prosperity to Costa Rica. Then it 
was his turn, and he drank ours^ ejaculating 
a sentiment in honor of Yenezuela. Two or 
three minutes more of pleasant gossip with 
him ; about the game in the neighborhood of 
the Garita, for he was a sporting character ; 
about the Filibusters, for he fought in Rivas, 
the 11th of April, 1856, and thought it glorious 
fun ; about his fighting-cocks, for he had an 
army of them ; two or three minutes more of 
this tete-a-tete^ a warm shake hands and the final 
adios, and up the road we started, leaving the 
Rio Grande hoarsely roaring in its jagged bed. 
The deep chasm — the sunset-colored walls over- 
topping the black waters, the long procession 
of carts, and mules, and oxen, descending and 



APPENDIX. 303 

winding up tlie opposing cliffs, the groups of 
soldiers and carreferos at tlie bridge, the bridge 
itself, the masses of foliage and blossoms re- 
lieving the cold hard face of rock, and soften- 
ing with their shadows the staring wildness of 
the abyss — all this was forgotten, when, strik- 
ing the level ground above the river, a vast am- 
phitheatre opened suddenly, boldly, magnifi- 
cently before us. 

Before us were the Plains of Carmen. To 
the right were the Codilleras and the volcanic 
heights of Barba and Irazu. To the left were 
the mountains of Santa Anna and San Miguel. 
Breadth, loftiness, infinitude ; no paltry sign of 
human life to blot the scene ; the sun in its full- 
ness ; the pulsation through the warm earth of 
distant waters ; the rumblings of the thunder in 
a sky where not an angry speck was visible ; 
wonder, homage, ecstasies ; it seemed, indeed, 
as if we had been disenthralled from the Old 
"World by some glorious magic, and were on the 
threshold, within sight, in the enjoyment of a 
new existence ! 

But what of that vast amphitheatre, over- 
shadowed, and with these immutable sublimi- 
ties environed ? It was once the bed of an im- 
mense lake. Suddenly set free by some violent 



304 APPENDIX. 

volcanic shock, the waters of the lake exhausted 
themselves through a rent which now forms the 
channel and outlet of the Rio Grande. Enor- 
mous rocks of calcined porphyry, protruding 
through the soil and blackening it far and wide, 
are the testimonies of this convulsion. The 
Plains of Carmen, the lower portion of the am- 
phitheatre, exhibit a loose dark loam intermixed 
with quantities of volcanic detritus. To this 
day they have been used as grazing grounds 
only. With a proper system of irrigation — and 
such a system, fed by the plenteous rains which 
fall during the months of June, July, August, 
September, and October, could be easily, cheaply, 
and extensively carried out — and with, of course, 
the necessary cultivation, they would yield the 
sugar-cane, Indian corn, tapioca^ and other trop- 
ical productions in extraordinary abundance. 
Thus where we have, for the most part, an idle 
and inanimate wilderness at present, a popula- 
tion of 100,000 — in addition to the actual popu- 
lation of the country, computed at something 
over 130,000 — might in this one section alone, 
be prosperously sustained. Elsewhere — all over 
the country, from Lake Nicaragua to the fron- 
tier of New Granada — whole nations, such as 
Portugal and Holland, would find the amplest 



APPENDIX. 305 

room and the best of living. The public un- 
appropriated lands, in the northern part of the 
Bepublic alone, according to Senor Astaburi- 
aga, amount to millions of acres. 



THE CAPITAL OF COSTA KICA. 

Sun-burned, coated with dust, sweltering a 
little and somewhat chafed, in our red flannel 
shirts and overall boots, both the one and the 
other rumpled and wrinkled, decidedly the worse 
for the wear, but nevertheless in the brightest 
good-humor — returning with smiles, and some- 
times with winks, the inquisitive glances which 
from door-ways and iron-barred windows sig- 
nalled our coming — between two and three 
o'clock in the afternoon we rode into San Jose, 
the capital of the Republic of Costa Eica. 

Jogging past the Artillery Barracks — at the 
rickety gate of which there stood a sentinel in 
soiled linen, with sandals of untanned ox-hide 
strapped to his heels and toes — then past the 
Palace of the Government, concerning which, 
and the other notable buildings and institutions 
of San Jose, we shall say a word or two in an- 
other chapter of oar Holidays — we dismounted 
at the door of the Hotel de Costa Rica. Ascend- 



306 APPENDIX. 

ing the staircase as leisurely and gracefully as our 
big boots and spurs would permit, we leaned 
over the banister at the first landing, and wished 
good-bye to Anselmo. At sundown that myste- 
rious creature set out for Punta Arenas, back the 
road which Nisus and Euryalus had come, with 
the three mules struggling behind him, the last 
being tied by the nose to the tail of the next 
one, and that one again being made fast in the 
same way to the other before him. 

Viewing it from the pretty balcony of the 
room into which we were shown by an amiable 
fat boy from Heidelberg, whose name was 
Charlemagne, the capital of Costa Bica appeared 
to be a compact little city, cross-barred with 
narrow streets, roofed with red tiles. There 
were flag-staffs and belfries too, and tufts of 
shining green foliage breaking through those 
red tiles — breaking through them here and 
there, and everywhere — and beyond and above 
them, but quite close to us it seemed, were the 
mountains of San Miguel — brown steeps cloven 
into valleys, and throwing out other heights, 
abrupt and black, in the deep shadow of which 
the smoke of the burning forest rolled up slow- 
ly and with a fleecy whiteness, and all over the 



APPENDIX. 307 

slopes of which the fields of sugar-cane fau4y 
glittered, their verdure was so vivid. 

May Heaven be with it — the bright, young, 
brave city of the Ceutral Andes — the silent but 
industrious, the modest but prosperous, the 
inofi'ensive but undismayed metropolis of the 
Switzerland of the Tropics ! 

Radiantly reposing there, with the palm-trees 
fanning it — the mangos shadowing its little court- 
yards — the snow^- white and snow-like blossoms 
of the coffee-tree, the glossy, smooth, rich foli- 
age of the guayaha and sweet lemon, the orange 
and banana breaking through the waste of red 
tiles, and filling the serene air with perfume — 
herds of cattle, the finest in the world, grazing 
in the paddocks or pofreros without the suburbs, 
or with a grand docility toiling through its 
streets, carrying to the market-place the pro- 
duce of the peasant, or to his home conveying 
back such accessories to his comfort as the ships 
from England, Hamburg, Guatemala, and 
France import, or such as the Panama railroad 
from more ingenious workshops, for sometime 
past, has hurried up — each one at his business, 
none idle, none too conceited to trade or work 
— an independent spirit, aiming at an independ- 



308 APrENDix. 

ent livelihood, animating all — the machinery 
of the Government working steadily, and for its 
ordained ends, with a commensurate success, 
though not, perhaps, with the high pressure and 
expansion which Democrats of infinite views, as 
some of us are, might with an impetuous rhetor- 
ic advise — a growing desire for a closer inter- 
course with the world, dissipating its fears and 
prejudices, quickening its intelligence, ennobling 
its counsels, and opening out, as the proposed 
new road to the Serapiqui will do, even through 
the wilderness where no white foot until this 
day has been, new channels for the enterprise, 
the resources, and the credit of the country — 
the National Flag, which through the vanishing 
ranks of no despicable adversaries has been vic- 
toriously borne, flying from the Barracks and 
the Palace of the Government, kindling in every 
native heart a just pride and a fearless patriot- 
ism — with all this before us, how could we do 
otherwise than invoke for that brave little city 
of the Central Andes — as I do now and ever 
shall — the sympathies of the American people 
and the shield of Providence ? 

Oh! may that Providence — typified by the 
vast mountain of Irazu which overshadows it, 
and which has long since quenched its fires and 



APPENDIX. 309 

become a glory instead of a terror to the scene 
— protect it to the end of time ; and safe amidst 
the everlasting hills — prosperous and inviolable 
— through many an improving epoch may it 
teach the lesson, that nations may be great — 
great in honest industry, great in the goodness 
of domestic life, great in the less ostentatious 
arts of peace, great in patriotism, great in hero- 
ism, great in being the living illustration of this 
inspiring lesson — though no navy rides the sea 
for them, and their territory be small ! 

* -jf * ^ * * 

LIFE IN SAN JOSE. 

The Police are picturesque. A little after 
sunset, they are mustered in the Plaza and told 
off for duty. With a carbine slung across the 
shoulder, a short brass-hilted sword and car- 
touche-box, a torn straw hat, and an old blanket, 
full of holes, as a uniform, they patrol the silent 
city until daybreak, calling the hours, whistling 
the alert every half-hour, and, as their dreary 
vigils terminate, offering up the oracion del sereno 
— Ave 3Iaria Furissima ! — in the most dismal 
recitative. 

They are faithful creatures, however, those 
ragged Policemen of San Jose. They are duti- 



310 APPENDIX. 

fill, vigilant, and brave, though a stranger now 
and then may come across one of them snoring 
on the steps of a door-way, as we did occasion- 
ally in our surveys of the city by moonlight. 
The first time this occurred to us, the poor fel- 
low was bundled up under the heel of an enor- 
mous boot, the original of which stands eight 
feet high in Chatham-street. The copy, at the 
corner of the Ccdle de la Puebla in San Jose, 
w^as furnished by an accomplished Filibuster to 
Mons. Eugenie, the French boot-maker, whose 
portentous sign it is. The artist was a prisoner 
of war. But even so, in captivity and defeat 
he proclaimed his principles. He stuck a spur 
with an immense rowel into the heel of the gi- 
gantic boot, and gave three cheers for General 
Walker and the Lone Star ! 

But there is no need of the Police — none 
whatever. Costa Bica is the most temperate and 
peaceful of countries, and San Jose is the most 
temperate and peaceful of cities. One might be 
provoked into saying it was stupidly well- 
behaved and insipidly sensible. The cMffonnier 
would have little to do there. The lawyer from 
the vicinity of the Tombs would fare no better. 
The. entire rasc;dity of the exemplary place is 
not worth an affidavit. Cock-fighting is the 



APPENDIX. 311 

only dissipation the people indulge in, and that 
on Feasts of Obligation and Sundays exclu- 
sively. 

Being one of the Institutions of the country, 
it would have never done for Don Kamon and 
Don Francisco to have overlooked or shunned 
the Cock-pit. Martyrs to the love of knowledge, 
they visited it with the purest motives, urged by 
a curiosity as disinterested as that which might 
have tempted a perfect stranger — an ancient 
Briton for instance — to drop into the Koman 
amphitheatre in the days of the Thracian prize- 
fights. 

Passing a rude door- way, they came upon an 
elderly gentleman with a rusty mustache. He 
was sitting in a chair scooped out of a block of 
mahogany, and held in his left hand a pack of 
small printed cards, the tickets of admission to 
the rascally arena. Having paid him two rials j 
he drew aside a torn pink calico curtain, and 
with a gracious entreM iistedes Senores, bowed, 
stroked his mustache, and resumed his col- 
lection of rials. A second after, the Martyrs 
found themselves in a windj^ wooden building, 
which seemed to them, for all the world, like a 
cow-shed that had been converted into some- 
thing resembling a circus. 



312 APPENDIX. 

It was Whitsunday. The place was crowded. 
All classes of society were represented there. 
The merchant and the peddler — Colonels with 
blazing epaulets and half-naked privates — doc- 
tors, lawyers, Government clerks, fathers of 
families, genteel gentlemen with ample waist- 
coats and gray heads, youths of eighteen and 
less — the latter peppered with the spiciest pert- 
aess, and boiling all over with a maddening 
avidity for j:)esos and cuartas. 

The benches of the theatre rise one above 
another, forming a square, within which, on the 
moist clay floor, enclosed by a slight wooden 
barrier eighteen inches high, is the fatal ring. 
In a nook to the right of the pink calico curtain, 
stands a small table, upon which the knives, the 
twine for fastening them, the stone and oil for 
sharpening them, the fine-toothed saw for cut- 
ting the gaffs, and all the other exquisite odds 
and ends, devised for the deadly equipment of 
the gladiators, ai*e laid out. The knives used in 
this, butchery are sharp as lancets, and curved 
like cimeters. While the lists are being 
arranged, and the armorers are busy lacing 
on the gyves and weapons of the combat- 
ants, and many an ounce of precious metal 
is risked on their chances of life and death, the 



APPENDIX. 313 

gladiators pertinaciously keep crowing with all 
their might, and in the glossiest feather saucily 
strut about the ring as far as their hempen 
garters will permit them. 

Don Ramon and his friend remarked, the mo- 
ment they entered, that the betting was high 
and brisk. Gold pieces changed hands with a 
dazzling rapidity. The Costa Ricans are pro- 
verbial for their economy and caution. Outside 
the Cock-pit they never spend a medio — not so 
much as half a dime — if they can help it. In- 
side this charmed circle, they are the most prod- 
igal of spendthrifts. One sallow lad particularly 
struck them. He had neither shoes nor stock- 
ings — not so much as a scrap of raw ox-hide to 
the sole of his foot. But had every pimple on 
his face been a ruby — and his face was a nursery 
of pimples — he could not have been more bold 
and lavish with his purse. It came, however, to 
a crisis with him. Stretching across Don 
Ramon to take the bet of another infatuated 
sportsman in broad-cloth and embroidered 
linen, he staked a fistful of gold on a red cock 
of the most seductive points and perfectly irre- 
sistible spunk. It was all he had in the world. 
There was a fluttering of cropped wings, a shak- 
ing of scarlet crests, a cross-fire of murderous 
U 



314 ArPENDIX. 

glances, a sudden spring, a bitter tussel, fuss 
and feathers, a pool of blood, and the fistful of 
gold — all that the sallow-skinned pimple-faced 
prodigal had in the world — was gone ! 

A ruthless, senseless, ignoble game, it is fast 
going out of fashion. There was a time, and 
that not more than five or six years ago, when 
the President and the whole of his Cabinet were 
to be seen in the Cock-pit. But it is seldom, if 
ever, that a distinguished politician, much less a 
statesman, even on the eve of an election, is 
discovered there now. Neither the mind, nor 
the manhood, nor the heart of the people will 
suffer when it has been utterly abolished. 

The morning after our arrival, we called on 
the Bishop of San Jose. His residence is an 
humble one. Two workmen, tip-toe on ladders, 
were repairing the plaster over the door-way 
just as we reached it. Stepping acioss a perfect 
morass of mortar, we entered the zaguan. An 
aged gentleman softly approached us before we 
had time to call the Portero and send in our 
cards. 

Tall, thin, sharp-featured, with a 3^ellowish 
brown skin and long spare fingers, his eye was 
keen, liis step firm, his voice distinct and full. 
He wore a pectoral gold cross and purple silk 



APPENDIX. 315 

cassock. The latter liad a waterish look. The 
purple had been diluted into pink. A velvet 
cap of the same weak color in great measure 
concealed his hair, which was short, and flat, 
and seemed as though it had been dashed with 
damp white pepper. It was the venerable An- 
selmo Loreute, the Bishop of San Jose. 

A door stood open on the left of the zaguan. 
The Bishop pointed to it. He did so with a 
sweet smile and graciousness. Bowing to him 
respectfully, we passed into a dull saloon. 

The walls were covered with a winterish pa- 
per, and would have been woefully bare were it 
not for three paintings which hung from the 
slim cornice opposite the windows looking into 
the street. One of these paintings — a likeness 
of Pius the Ninth — was really a treasure. A 
superb souvenir of Eome, it had all the softness, 
the calmness, the exquisite minuteness of finish 
Axhich characterize the works of Carlo Dolce. 
The likeness ef Anselmo Lorente looked raw 
and miserable beside it. The third painting 
represented the ascension of a devout Prelate 
in full pontificals from the grave. For so glar- 
ing an outrage on canvas, it would have been 
a just chastisement had the Painter gone down 
while the Prelate went up. 



316 APPENDIX. 

Between the two windows facing these paint- 
ings, there stood a table of dark mahogany. It 
was covered with faded red moreen, books, 
pieces of sealing-wax, quills, and papers. An 
arm-chair stood behind the table. Behind the 
arm-chair there stood a screen, and from this 
a canopy projected. Arm-chair, screen, and 
canopy, everything was covered with faded red 
moreen. There was neither carpeting nor mat- 
ting on the floor. The boards, however, were 
warmly coated with dust, the accumulation of 
months of domestic repose. 

Having read the letters we had handed him 
on entering, the Bishop rose from the sofa — a 
sad piece of furniture it was — and cordially 
welcomed us to San Jose. The cordiality of 
the w^elcome was tempered with dignity. It was 
the subdued cordiality of age. 

Just then there was a tap at the door. The 
Bishop was called out for a moment. During 
his absence, a monk of the Kefo'rmed Order of 
St. Francis entered the room. He was from 
Quito. Heavily clothed in a drab gown and 
cloak, drab hood and trowsers, all cut out of a 
wool and cotton mixture manufactured in the 
Andes of Ecuador, with his cropped head, a 
face the color of pale butter, and a pair of dark- 



APPENDIX. 317 

blue spectacles — behind which his large bhick 
eyes rolled incessantly — he was, in truth, a 
strange apparition. The Archbishop of Ecua- 
dor being dead, and the Archbishop of Panauja 
being absent from that city on a visitation of 
his diocese, the pious brother of St. Francis had 
journeyed to Costa Rica to be ordained. 

The Bishop, resuming his seat on the sofa, 
presented his case of cigarettos — it w^as a dainty 
little case made of colored straw — and invited 
us to smoke. The holy hobgoblin from Quito 
taking the media from the table, where it lay 
coiled up in the inkstand, succeeded, after a 
number of failures, in striking a light. Where- 
upon he knelt and extended the media to the 
Bishop. The Bishop having lit his dgaretto, the 
good monk kissed the episcopal ring, and rising 
with a profound obeisance, solemnly extin- 
guished the fire. Shortly after, having silently 
glared at us through his purple spectacles, he 
bent the knee again, kissed the episcopal ring 
once more, and with head cast down, tucking 
his drab gown about him, retreated with a con- 
fused modest}^ from the room. 

In the midst of fragrant clouds, Senor Lo- 
rente pleasantly conversed with us. He spoke 
about the country, its drawbacks, its resources 



318 APPENDIX. 

and its prospects, and in a few bright sentences, 
enunciated with considerable animation, gave 
lis the principal points of its political history. 

It was a deep source of regret to him that the 
churches of San Jose contained little to interest 
the stranger. They had no works of art, no 
paintings, no sculpture, and very few ornaments. 
The few they possessed were of the humblest 
description. The Spaniards had concentrated 
in Guatemala the entire wealth of the Central 
American church, and, up to this, Costa Rica 
had been too poor to enrich her altars. In 
Cartago, however, there were some old and val- 
uable paintings, two or three fine images, 
shrines, reliquaries, and vestments of costly 
material and curious workmanship. From the 
churches, Senor Lorente passed to the Indians 
of the country. His statements and surmises 
relative to the Guatusos of the valley of Frio — 
a race living absolutely secluded and permitting 
no stranger whatever to set foot within their 
mysterious domain — were deeply interesting. 
Every syllable he let fall upon this subject was 
eagerly caught up. 

In the end, he referred us to the History of 
Guatemala by the Archbishop, Francisco de 
Paula Garcia Pelaez. There was a learned and 



APPENDIX. 319 

profound chapter in it devoted to the Guatusor,. 
We should read it. He would give us a copy 
of the work. It would be a pledge to us of his 
regard, and of his anxiety to aid us in our laud- 
able researches. He was delighted to find we 
had been educated by the Jesuits. They were 
the nobility, the flower, the chivalry of the 
Church. Her bravest soldiers, they had been 
her sublimest martyrs. Wherever they were, 
there was civilization, erudition, eloquence, a 
disciplined society, an elevated faith, and the 
loftiest example of magnanimity. It would be 
well for Costa Rica were they established in 
the country. But there was an ignorant preju- 
dice against them, and his efforts to obtain ad- 
mission and a recognized standing for them in 
the Republic, had proved unavailing so far. 

As we rose to take leave, the Bishop opened 
the door leading into the zaguan, and calling to 
a young student who was reading in the piazza 
of the court-yard, desired him to take the His- 
tory of Guatemala from the library, and accom- 
pany us with it to the Hotel. We begged him 
not to trouble the young student. We could 
easily take the books ourselves. But the gra- 
cious good Bishop would have his own way. 
His consideration for us was relentless. And 



320 APPENDIX. 

SO, we returDed to our quarters, followed by the 
History of Guatemala, in three volumes, and a 
modest youth in a clerical cloak, and a brown 
felt hat of the California pattern. 

* * ^ * * * * 

HOLY WEEK. 

When evening came, the procession which 
commemorates the interment of Christ, moved 
slowly and darkly from the great door-way of 
the Cathedral, and, descending into the Plaza, 
entered and passed through the adjoining 
streets. The aceras or side-walks of these 
streets were planted with wild canes, round 
which the leaves of the palm and wreaths of 
flowers were woven, the carriage-way being 
strewn with the seimpreviva, the finer branches 
of the UTiica, and the wondrous and beauteous 
manitas of the giiarumo. Curtains of white 
muslin, festooned with crape or ribbons of black 
silk and satin, overhung the balconies of the 
houses along the line of the procession, and at 
the intersection of the streets were catafalques 
covered with black embroidered cloth, strewn 
with flowers, laden with fruit, and luminous 
with colored lamps and cups of silver. The 
pioneers of the procession were Brothers of 



APPENDIX. 321 

Charity — Xo.<? Hermanos de la Caridad^cloihed 
in long white woollen garments, shapeless and 
loose as bed-gowns, with white or checkered 
cotton handkerchiefs, tied with a pig-tail knot, 
about their heads. These Brothers carried the 
various insignia of the Crucifixion. The two 
first balanced a pair of green ladders upon their 
shoulders. One bore a crown of thorns on a 
breakfast-tray, another a sponge in a stained 
napkin, the third an iron hammer and three 
nails. Then came a swarm of boys with extin- 
guished candles. After them, three young men 
in ecclesiastical costume appeared, the one in 
the middle bearing a tall slender silver crucifix 
— the crucifix being shrouded in black velvet — 
the other two holding aloft the thinnest candle- 
sticks, the yellow tapers in which burned with 
an ashy flame, melting excessively as they feebly 
gleamed. Close behind the candlesticks and 
crucifix there walked four priests abreast, each 
one in soidaine, black cap and surplice. There 
was a black hood drawn over the black cap, 
while a black train, the dorsal development of 
the hood, streamed along the baf-strewn pave- 
ment a yard or two behind. They were the 
heralds of a large black silk banner which had 
a red cross blazoned on it, and was borne erect 
14* 



322 APPENDIX. 

by a sickly gentleman in deep mourning. Then 
came anotlier swarm of boys, clearing the road 
for a full-length figure of St. John the Evangel- 
ist, which in a complete suit of variegated vest- 
ments, and with the right hand pressed upon 
the region of the heart, was shouldered along 
by four young gentlemen, all bare-headed and 
in full evening dress. A figure of Mary Mag- 
dalene followed that of the Evangelist. It was 
radiant with robes of white satin and luxuriant 
tresses of black hair, and the noble beauty of 
the face was heightened by an expression of in- 
tense contrition. As works of art, these figures 
are more than admirable. They are exquisite 
and wonderful. Guatemala, where they have 
been wrought, has reason to be proud of them. 
But one, loftier far and statelier than those 
preceding it, approached. Lifted bayonets were 
gleaming to the right and left of it, thuribles 
w^ere rolling up their fragrant clouds around it, 
pretty children in white frocks, and fresh as rose- 
buds, were throwing flow^ers in front of it all 
over the leafy pavement. It was the Mater Do- 
lorosa. Sumptuously robed, the costliest lace 
and purple velvet, pearls of the largest size, 
opals and other precious stones, were lavished 
on it. From the queenly head there issued rays 



APPENDIX. 323 

of silver wLicli flashed as tliongli they were 
spears of crystal. The black velvet train, de- 
scending from the figure, was borne by a priest. 
Behind him, carrying long wax candles, were 
many of the first ladies of the city, all dressed 
in black silk or satin, their heads concealed in 
rich mantillas, and these, too, black as funeral 
palls could be. Some of them were young, ten- 
derly graceful, and of a pearly beauteousness. 
The matrons, though slim and parched, were 
dignified and saintly. 

All this, however, was but the prelude to the 
absorbing feature of the pageant. This was an 
immense sarcophagus of glass, upheld by some 
twenty of the most respectable citizens of San 
Jose, whose step had all the emphasis and gran- 
deur of practised soldiers. Acolytes bearing 
inverted torches, and smoking censers, and 
palm-branches covered with crape, went before, 
flanked, and followed it. And as it was borne 
along, the spectators at the door-ways, in the 
balconies, at the windows, on the side-walks, 
uncovered their heads and knelt. Within the 
transparent tomb w^ere folds of the finest linen 
: — snowy folds strewn with roses — a face stream- 
ing with blood, a crown of thorns, and the out- 
line of a prostrate image. The image was that 



324 APPENDIX. 

of The Crucified of Calvary. As it passed, no 
one spoke. There was not a whisper even. The 
swelling and subsiding music of the military 
band — heading the column of troops with which, 
colors furled and arms reversed, the procession 
closed — alone disturbed, at that solemn moment, 
the peacefulness of San Jose. 

A few hours later there was a very different 
scene. It was the dawn of Easter Sunday. The 
clouds lay full and low upon the mountains. 
San Miguel was a pile of clouds. The dark 
green base of Irazu alone was visible. The 
plantations and potreros were overwhelmed with 
clouds. It was a chaos of clouds all round. 
Nothing else was distinguishable. Nothing — 
unless, indeed, the lamp at the corner of the 
Calle del Artilleria, the light from which sput- 
tered through the thick smoke with which the 
glass was blurred. But in the midst of this 
chaos of clouds, the bells of the Cathedral, the 
Mercedas and the Carmen, suddenly broke loose. 
Briskly, wildly, violentl}^ they rang out ! Again 
and again rang out ! Again and again, until 
the riotous air seemed to flash with the strokes ! 
Again and again, until the drowsy earth seemed 
to reel and quiver ! 

Then came the rumbling of drums, and the 



APPENDIX. 325 

shrill chorusing of fighting-cocks, and the yelp- 
ing of dogs, and the moaning of the cattle in the 
suburbs. In less than twenty minutes every 
house in San Jose was pouring out its inmates 
— pouring thenl out in ponclias and mantillas, in 
shawls, velvet-collared cloaks and shirt-sleeves 
— down u]3on the Plaza. And there — as the 
clouds lifted, and the mountains began to show 
themselves, and the sun streamed over the 
broken crest of Irazu — a startling spectacle 
broke upon the view. 

The Plaza was full of people. The spacious 
esplanade and steps of the Cathedral were 
thronged to overflowing. The balconies and 
windows of the houses overlooking the Plaza — 
the balconies and windows of the houses con- 
verging on the Plaza — all sparklpd and rustled 
with spectators. Every one was excited — every 
one was chattering — every one was smoking — 
every one was laughing — every one was on tip- 
toe — every one was impatient, fidgety, and nerv- 
ous. There was something in the wind ! 

High above the crowd — in the centre of the 
Plaza — were four lines of gleaming steel. The 
troops had formed a hollow square, and within 
this square, overtopping the lifted bayonets by 
twenty feet at least, there stood a monstrous 



326 APPENDIX. 

gibbet. Fastened together with thongs of raw 
hide and pieces of old rope, the limbs of this 
gibbet were gaunt and ghastly enough to scare 
the boldest malefactor. From the cross-beam 
there dangled a foul bundle of old clothes. 
There was a red night-cap — a yellow flannel 
waistcoat, striped with black, the arms out- 
stretched — a pair of torn brown breeches and 
musty boots, the latter crumpled at the toes and 
woefully wasted at the heels. Night-cap, boots, 
and waistcoat all were stuffed with Roman can- 
dles, squibs, and crackers, while the breeches 
were burdened with a bomb-shell made of the 
toughest pasteboard and swollen with combusti- 
bles. It was the effigy of Judas Iscariot ! 
There — in the dewy dawn, with the faint soft 
light of the Easter morn playing on the night- 
cap, in the full strained view of thousands — the 
similacrum of the traitor dangled, slowly turning, 
half-way round at times, as a puff from the 
mountains strayed against and elbowed it igno- 
miniously aside. 

The trumpet having sounded, a barefooted 
Corporal stepped from the ranks. Erect, emo- 
tionless, with cold solemnity he approached the 
gibbet, carrying a long spare sugar-cane, at the 



APPENDIX. 



327 



end of which was a tnft of lighted tow. As he 
neared the gibbet, the hubbub of the multitude 
subsided. A profound calm set in. The boys 
themselves — the gamins of San Jose — frenzied 
with fun and mischief as they were— huddled 
together and held their breath a moment. Step 
by step, gravely measuring his way, the Cor- 
poral still kept on, until at last he came ab- 
ruptly to a halt right under the cross-beam. 
The sugar-cane was lifted. It touched the left 
heel of the scoundrel overhead. In the twink- 
ling of an eye, there was a terrific explosion ! 
The boot flew in shreds— flames leaped from the 
stomach— the bomb-shell burst and split the 
brown breeches into a shower of rags and soot 
— rockets whizzed from the ribs — the out- 
stretched arms vanished from their sockets in a 
gust of sulphur — the red night-cap shot up clean 
out of sight, and, a few seconds after, plopped 
down in cinders over the sign-board of the 
Eestaurant, next door to the Barracks : all this 
in less than two minutes, amidst the crashing of 
drums, the excruciating screams of the boys, the 
crowing of cocks and the yelping of dogs, the 
tittering of the modest signoritas and signoras, 
the gabbling of parrots, a tempestuous flight of 



328 ArPENDTX. 

stones, and the hootings, maldiciones, and up* 
roarioiis merriment of soldiers and civilians, 
priests, paupers, and patricians. 

When the smoke cleared off, the back-bone 
was all that remained of the exploded ruffian. 
And that — being of iron — continued to dangle 
at the end of the rope until the gibbet was low- 
ered. In half an hour, the Plaza had resumed 
its decorum, loneliness, and silence. 



THE CITY OF CARTAGO. , 

Dull and desolate as it habitually is, there are 
two days out of the seven, when Cartago wakes 
up. There is Sunday, when the Church-bells 
prove to distraction the metal the3^'re made of, 
and the SeiiOras and Senoritas, with their grace- 
ful draperies of black and colored shawls, glide 
to and from the churches, and the militia of the 
District parade and drill all the forenoon in the 
Plaza, and the most reputable people, the Judi- 
ciary included, indulge in lotteries, v in gt-im, and 
draughts, in the widest and longest room of the 
Hotel, whenever any such institution contributes 
to the conveniences, the cheap dissipation, and, 
as in the case of Don Carlos, to the ups and 
downs, the brandy-smashes and bankruptcies, 



APPENDIX. 329 

the convulsions and woes of Cartago. On Sun- 
day evenings, moreover, the Band of the little 
garrison performs in front of the house in which 
the Governor of the Province resides. But the 
Thursdays are livelier, though, in the absence 
of the Band and the Bells, a native might say 
they were somewhat less musical. Thursdays 
are market-days in Cartago. 

The Plaza— the massive white towers of the 
Parochial Church on one side — substantial one- 
storied houses, with projecting roofs and bowed- 
windows, on the other — the Cuartel and Gover- 
nor's Audience-Hall in front, all glistening wdth 
whitewash, and close behind them, the volcano 
of Irazu, the sun flashing from its cloven fore- 
head, and the snowy clouds gathering round it, 
as the Sicilian flocks crowded to the Cyclops — 
these are the outlines of the picture. It is a 
vivid blending of most of the contrasts of Trop- 
ical life with the majesty of nature. 

The streets leading into the Plaza are thronged 
— thronged with carts and oxen, with mules and 
muleteers, with soldiers and wandering minstrels 
— thronged with booths and beggars, and with 
cripples who imploringly work out a fortune 
with their distorted bones. In the Plaza we have 
innumerable articles for sale, and, pictorially 



330 APPENDIX. 

viewed, the gayest of groups. We Lave rain- 
bow-colored silk- woven shawls from Guatemala, 
blankets, and brigand-like jackets with super- 
fluous bright buttons and fringes. We have the 
cacao-nut in ox-hide bags, which barelegged 
sinewy fellows have carried up all the way from 
Matina, and drinking-cups, carved out of the 
Calabash-fruit with an exquisite nicety of touch 
and an elaborate richness of design. At other 
stalls we have English printed-calicoes, hareges, 
penknives, crockery-ware, scissors, smoothing- 
irons, scythes, and razors. From the United 
States, I'm sorry to say, we have little* or noth- 
ing. There are, to be sure, some American 
drillings. But that, for the present, with a few 
coils or sticks of Virginia tobacco, is all we have 
in the market. Cartago herself contributes hats 
— soft hats made of the fibre of the Century- 
plant — and gold-work, such as chains and arm- 
lets, love-knots and votive baskets, the latter 
with the most tempting delicacy constructed 
and redundant with pearls — roseate, plump, 
lustrous pearls — from the Gulf of Nicoya. Then, 
of course, we have oranges, cocoa-nuts, sweet 
corn, bananas, zapotes, sweet lemons, and grana- 
dillas, the most liquid and refreshing of fruits, 
edible palm-tops, which make the most piquant 



APPENDIX. 331 

and delicious of salads, blackberries, the blackest 
and juciest that ever purpled one's lips, and 
potatoes as mealj and toothsome as any Irish 
mouth could desire. 

As for the groups and detached figures — • 
filling up, though dispersed, through the pic- 
ture — there are seiioras richly dressed, cooling 
their bai'e and glossy heads with the airiest 
sun-shades, accompanied by their criadas, who 
carry on their plump shining arms baskets 
for the purchase their mistresses make. At 
times you come across a German housewife, 
with leg-of-mutton sleeves and Leghorn bonnet. 
The mesiizas — the women of the country — in very 
loose low-necked dresses of white or colored 
calico, with bare arms and feet, sit behind their 
serones of fruit and vegetables, behind their 
blocks of cheese and cJiancaca, the coarse brown 
sugar of the country, or behind a double row of 
bottles choked with giiarapo, the fermented 
juice of the sugar-cane, and wdth accents as 
liquid and refreshing as the giiarcqoo, and with 
a shy gracefulness if the passer-by happens to 
be a stranger, expatiate upon the merits of their 
merchandise, and press their varied commodities 
for sale. 

Besides their very loose and low-necked 



332 APPENDIX. 

dresses of white or colored calico, these win- 
some merchants sport the prettiest jDert little 
hats, some made of straw, others of black, 
brown, or slate -colored felt. Most of them 
mount cockades of blue or red silk, and all of 
them fl}', as though they were Recruiting-Ser- 
geants, the most bewitching bright ribbons. 
They are perfect heart-breakers — those pert lit- 
tle hats — and, to settle the business, the young 
women of Costa Rica are decidedly handsome. 
Their figures are full and round, their features 
regularly cut, their eyebrows richly pencilled, 
and the well-developed head is set upon a neck 
which displays to the best advantage the pretty 
string of beads which few of them dispense with. 
Their complexion, generally speaking, suggests 
a conserve of cream and roses. The pure ex- 
hilarating air of the mountains, in the valleys 
and up the slopes of which two-thirds of the 
Costa Rican people have their homes, tones 
down the carnation richness of the Spanish 
blood, chastens, and with a pearly hue suffuses 
it. There are, to be sure, some brown, and 
yellowish, and bronzed, and mottled faces to be 
met with, and some cases of goitre, but not 
enough to contradict what I have said, and 
make it the exception instead of the rule. . The 



APPENDIX. 333 

old women, however, even those approximating 
the climax of forty — an age, which in these 
more temperate regions of ours serves only to 
mature the coloring and give dignity to the 
stature of womanhood — are the reverse of what 
they were in their youth. They are octogena- 
rians at forty. 

To what this premature overcasting of so 
much beauteousness and light may be owing, I 
leave the professors of ethnology, as well as the 
professors of pathology and the chemistry of 
common life, to determine. For my part, I own 
up to a vulgar impression, that if there were 
considerable less vegetables and esculent roots 
eaten, and considerable more of the poultry, 
the mutton, and good beef of the country con- 
sumed, the case would be different. 

But however that be, it is time for us to wish 
good-bye to the Seiioras and the Seiioritas, 
which, be they young or old, blooming or faded, 
it becomes us respectfully to do. This done, to 
the barefooted soldiers, with muskets and fixed 
bayonets patrolling the market-place, let us 
give the salute. To the careteros and arrieros, 
to the teamsters and mule-drivers, mingling 
with their mothers, their wives, their pretty 
daughters and handsome sweethearts, let us 



334 APPENDIX. 

bid the national adios — adios Senores ! Last of 
all, to the venerable Deacon of the Diocese — 
a very old and feeble man in faded red silk 
soutaine, with a pocket handkerchief of the 
largest size coiled about his head underneath 
his umbrageous hat, for the day is hot, though 
the clouds are mustering fast on Irazu — to the 
Deacon of the Diocese, as he wheezes along, 
and with his gold-knobbed stick shuffles through 
the crowd, receiving as he passes, from bent 
and uncovered heads, the edifying homage of 
the young and old, let us, too, with reverence 
for gray hairs and aged limbs, and for the filial 
love with which he is entitled the Father of his 
People, incline the head — and for the scene 
from which we now depart, heartily let us wish 
many and many a recurrence, each succeeding 
one still happier than the one preceding, in the 
market-place of old Cartago ! 



THE VOLCANO OF IRAZU. 

It was three o'clock in the afternoon, April 
the 23d, 1858, that, mounted od two strong 
knowledgeable mules, with the necessary amount 
of blankets and baskets, we set out from the 
Hotel de Irazu to the Yolcan de Irazu. To our 



APPENDIX. ■ 335 

first stopping-place, the road, though rough and 
broken by huge boulders and fragments of lava- 
stone, and crisp, quick, bright streams which 
crossed it, was a gradual ascent. It was an un- 
interesting country, however, we passed through. 
There w^ere corn-fields, potato-fields, grazing- 
grounds, and, here and there, a stunted tree by 
the road-side, but that was all. Yet it mat- 
tered little. For the sky was blue and speck- 
less, and the air was fresh and bracing, and 
our mules were nimble and spontaneously pro- 
gressive, and our hearts were light. That es- 
pecially of Don Eamon was so, for he had that 
day heard of the uprising of the people of Vene- 
zuela, and the recall from banishment of his 
beloved and aged father ; and his old school- 
fellow participated in his proud joy, and the 
two, that glorious sweet evening, ascended the 
volcano of Irazu, as though they themselves 
were laurelled heroes making a triumphal march. 
The cattle-farm of Cerado belongs to Nicom- 
edes Saens, a wealthy young Costa Eican, who 
is at this moment, I believe, completing his 
education in an Athenian city of the United 
States. At a height of 1500 feet, it overlooks 
the dismantled white towers and emerald valley 
of Cartago. The sea is 7,000 feet below. The 



336 APPENDIX. 

greater part of it,tliougli nominally a cattle-farm, 
is under cultivation, and yields the finest po- 
tatoes, peaches, and quinces, in abundance. 
From the keen wind which frequently sweeps 
down from the cone of the volcano, it is sheltered 
by a broad belt of Alpine oak — encino it is called 
— and the guarumo, which closely resembles the 
Mexican arhol das las manitas, the leaf of which, 
representing the human hand, has been for 
generations an object of religious veneration 
with the natives and peasantry of Mexico. This 
belt is the haunt of tigers, and there are snakes 
without end or measure there, those especially 
of the tohoha species, which, though excessively 
venomous below, the mountaineers persist in 
saying are innocuous in these colder regions. 

The house itself, like most of the farm-houses 
of the country, is built of canes and cedar 
posts, stuccoed outside with mud, and thatched 
with plantain-leaves and corn-husks. A numer- 
ous family occupies it — three daughters, two 
brothers, a father and mother. One of the 
daughters is a young widow, whose husband 
was killed in the campaign against the Fili- 
busters. Her sisters, Manuela and Eafaela, are 
modest, pretty, white-skinned, black-eyed girls, 
blushing, smiling, bright-minded, and industri- 



APPENDIX. 337 

ous. Manuela wears a rosary of gold round her 
little neck. The sons are lithe, picturesquely- 
featured, unobstrusive, active and hard-work- 
ing as their sisters are. The mother is gracious, 
pious, motherly, and WTiukled, sedulous in her 
attentions to strangers, and proud as a Spartan 
dame of the son who was slain in battle. 

The father is a man whom Salvator Kosa 
should have painted. His name is Benito. 
Benito is a wiry, tall, hardy fellow, with a long, 
curved, quick-scenting nose, and round full eyes 
which roll incessantly, and flash at intervals. 
Night and day, blazing or freezing, his neck, 
and arms, and chest are bare. A loose coarse 
flannel shirt, striped like the skin of a tiger, a 
tattered straw-hat, and bhie cotton trowsers, 
one leg of which is tightly rolled up to the knee 
while the other dangles in fringes, is the only 
covering he wears. He is the perfection — the 
Bayard !— of a mountaineer. He knows every 
rock, every tree, every bird, every root, every 
beast, every shrub and flower, every reptile, 
every dead and living thing that Irazu has 
borne, or still gives birth to. Intelhgent in the 
highest degree, his brain is as quick as his 
foot, and that has the elasticity of the deer and 
the glancing speed of the arrow. For years he 
15 



66b APPENDIX. 

has tracke 1 the tiger throngh the oaks that 
s'lelter the potrero of Cerado, and elsewhere 
have root in the rude breast of Irazu, and has 
wet the lava with the blood of the prowler. 
Hence he is known as the Tiger-hunter. Far 
and wide that is his recognized title. 

Two o'clock, in the morning — having had a cup 
of delicious chocolate made for us by Manuela 
and Rafaela, the Rose and Blanche of our wan- 
dering story — we left the house at Cerado. A 
few paces plunged us into the heart of the forest. 
It w^as pitch-dark. There w^as nothing to light 
us but the lamp of the Tiger-hunter. For an 
hour and more, it seemed as though we were 
making our way through a subterranean pas- 
sage. There was the precarious glimmering of 
the blurred lamp — there were the foot-falls of 
the mules — there was the rustling of the leaves 
and the crackling of the branches as we brushed 
or struck against them — there w^as at times, far 
apart, the cry or whistle of some soHtary bird. 
Had sheeted skeletons, grinning and glaring, 
come upon us, we should not have been sur- 
prised. Moving up so long through this flicker- 
ing darkness, we had come to regard ourselves as 
spectres or outlaws of the earth, and any kin- 
dred apparition, instead of striking us with dis- 



APPENDIX. 339 

may, would have been welcomed with a wild and 
lawless sympathy. When we least dreamed of 
it, however, the forest opened — tore asunder as 
it were — and through the light of the mellowed 
moon, we looked down toward the valley out of 
which we had come. Clouds were over it. 
They were white clouds — clouds of the purest 
fleece and swan-down, one would think — and the 
light of the mellowed moon, pouring down upon 
them, made them look like crystal hills veined 
with gold, rising from an unfathomable lake. 

But it was the vision of a moment only. The 
forest closed upon us as suddenly as it had 
opened, and there we were, for another hour or 
more, through the same low, dark, narrow pas- 
sage as before, stumbling over stones, striking 
against branches, crouching lest we might be 
swept off and out of our saddles, coming every 
now and then to a halt, and leaving the patient 
mules to their sure instinct. And, finally, the 
branches growing thicker and spreading them- 
selves lower down — the path narrowing — the 
bare and brawny roots tripping us up at every 
step — the stirrup-leathers catching in the thorny 
undergrowth, the arbutus-briers and yellow- 
leafed composita interwoven with fern and dwarf 
laurel — forced, at last, to dismount and drag the 



340 APPENDIX. 

mules after us — in the end, scaling a perpendicu- 
lar ladder a thousand feet high, the rungs of 
which were fallen trees, deep ruts, shelving 
stones and rocks — there we were, another hour 
or more, toiling and aching in the dense dark- 
ness — Benito, the Tiger-hunter, with his quiver- 
ing blurred lamp, phantom-like, leading the way. 

A second time, suddenly emerging from the 
forest, in which we left the blackness of the 
night imprisoned, there broke the light of 
morning over us on the bleak dumb ridge of 
Irazu ! 

Below us were the dismantled white towers 
and emerald valley of Cartago — below us were 
the seven hills and gardens of Paraiso — below 
us were the three rivers, the ancient Indian vil- 
lage, and the sloping forests of Orosi^-below us 
were the mountains of the Agua Caliente and 
the nobler Candellaria — beyond us, and above, 
was the supreme Andean Chain itself. But 
neither dismantled white tower, nor emerald 
valley, nor river, nor forest, nor ancient Indian 
village, nor mountain, nor Andean Chain itself 
was visible. From the silent, cold, desolate 
height on which we stood, nothing was to be 
seen but a wilderness of the whitest clouds — • 
nothing was to be seen but an illimitable frozen 



APPENDIX. 341 

sea, througli which, as the sun ascended, the 
isolated peaks, and then the surging ridges of 
the loftier mountains, one by one, as though 
they were newly-discovered cliffs and islands, 
rose up and glittered. And then — as we breath- 
lessly gazed upon it, and our eyes filled up with 
dazzling tears, and we sank upon the ashes sub- 
dued by fatigue, and from sharp cold and over- 
straining were incapable of speech, and well-nigh 
were deprived of vision — over this frozen sea 
there floated an enormous purple cloud streaked 
with crimson. A dismasted war-ship, it seemed 
to us, drifting through fields of ice and icebergs 
into the Antarctic solitudes. After all our 
climbing — after all our groping in the dark — 
after all our stumbling over stones and roots — 
after all our scrambling through thick-set oaks, 
fern, dwarf-laurel and arbutus-briers — after all 
our ups and downs, fears and superstitions, per- 
vading shadoAvs and sudden lights, swimming 
eyes and reeling brains — behold our goal and 
recompense in the crater of Irazu ! 

Exhausted with its convulsions, it yawns there 
calmly, though coldly and dismally, in the pure 
sweet light of the morning, the Gladiator in 
Eepose ! 

Standing with folded arms on the brink of 



342 APPENDIX. 

that abyss, what is the thought that overwhelms 
and subjugates the mind ? It is that of terrific 
strength entranced in soHtude. Standing there, 
you feel as though you had been spirited from 
the living world, and were in the presence of 
a creation which, thousands of years ago, had 
been lost, and which it had been reserved for 
you to find, or which, glowing for the first time 
with the breath of the Creator, was not yet 
perfect, and had still to be divulged. 

It grows brighter and warmer, ho^^'ever, and 
the sensations and fancies the vision first ex- 
cited, having, like a wild throbbing sea, gone 
down, you become reconciled to and familiar 
with the place — at home, in fact, though fright- 
fully out of the way — and wrapping your blue 
or red California blanket about you, for there's 
nothing in this miserable world comparable to 
it when one's up in the clouds — you commence 
to take outlines and notes. Don Eamon and 
Don Francisco, steadying themselves a little, at- 
tempted to do so. But, first of all, they found 
they had to take something. 

What is Something ? 

It depends on tastes and is controlled by 
circumstances. Under these conditions, it may 
be Cogniac or Monongahela, brown Sherry, 



APPENDIX. 343 

Apple-jack, Jersey-Lightning, Bourbon, or Ca- 
tawba. With us it was old Scotch whisky. 
And that old Scotch whisky, at that moment, 
was to us what the amrita — the Drink of Im- 
mortality administered by the Mystic Sisters — 
was to the warriors of the Sanscrit Mythology. 
Invigorated and enlivened by it, what was it we 
pencilled off and noted down ? Why this — that 
we were in the crater of Irazu, which had so 
horribly disgorged itself in 1723, and had ever 
since kept grumbling to the disquietude and dis- 
may of thousands — that the crater was an am- 
phitheatre with broken walls, 7,500 feet in cir- 
cumference, throwing up a cone of ashes and 
rapilli, 1000 feet in height — that the floor on 
which we stood had exploded, or caved in, to 
the depth of 50 fathoms — that in the lower 
floor, loose and shelving as it was, there were 
four openings, out of one of which came puffs of 
sulphurous smoke— that we had been warned 
not to descend, for though the descent was easy, 
the ascent, owing to the shifting lava-sand, 
was exhausting in the extreme, if it was not 
fatally impracticable — that in the last eruption, 
that of 1841, the flood of lava had rushed 
over a precipice of 2,000^eet, had spent itself 
in the densely-wooded wilderness to the North, 



344 APPENDIX. 

and thus spared the city and the valley 
of Cartago, spnnkling, instead of deluging, the 
latter in its ravenous ebullition — this is what 
we pencilled off and noted down. Had the 
weather been -clearer, in one glance we might 
have seen the two great oceans, the Atlantic and 
Pacific. This is the crowning recompense of 
the ascent of Irazu. But John L. Stephens was 
more fortunate, and he has left us, in his clear 
and vivid w^ords, the impression of what he 
saw and felt, when, as we did, he stood on the 
ridge, and looked out, wide over the remote 
world from the crater of Irazu. 



THE LAST DAYS. 

Crossing the valley of Uj arras, we visited the 
coffee-plantation of Dr. George Guirey, of Phil- 
adelphia, where w^e met with a cordial hospital- 
ity, encountered another colony of monkeys, 
who furiously evinced on our heads their aver- 
sion to foreigners, visited the Falls of the Berbis 
— grander still than those of the Macho, the 
torrent, leaping from the abrupt ledge above, 
being but a misty speck in the chasm, five hun- 
dred feet below — and where we ate, drank, talked 
preposterous politics, shouted the Marseillaise, 



APPENDIX. 345 

spread ourselves on Manifest Destiny and ox- 
hides, smoked, drank again, and finally fell off 
to sleep to the roar of the Keventazon. 

Starting from the Doctor's at sunrise, we 
travelled for miles with Pedro over a narrow 
quagmire running along the face of the moun- 
tains of Cervantes. Gigantic laurels, arbores- 
cent ferns, oaks and cedars, wild fig-trees of 
enormous girth, overspread the soaking path, 
entangled or towered above it, while, here and 
there, streams gurgled across it, tumbling into 
the precipice we overlooked, the profound 
silence, at times, being broken only by the shrill 
clarion-notes of the wild turkey, the nervous 
springing of the deer through the thickets, the 
booming of the wild peacock, the creaking of 
the trapiche, crushing the sugar-cane in some 
lonesome clearing in the forest, the cavernous 
voices of the howling monkeys, or the rumbling 
of distant thunder. As the day brightened, we 
entered the sugar-plantation of Naranjo, one of 
the finest in the country, and breakfasted there 
on oranges, plucking the fruit from the tree, 
without dismounting from our mules. This 
over, away we went, down a break-neck hill, the 
vegetation growing ranker and the air more 
sultry, until, at last, looking up from the valley 
15* 



346 APPENDIX. 

into which we had desceucled, we beheld the 
volcano of Turrialba — the volcano of the White 
Tower — with its vast pillar of smoke and fire, 
belted with an impervious forest of palm — remote, 
m3'sterious, awe-inspiring, inaccessible it is said 
— looming against the sky ! 

That volcano is a terror to the people — the 
burning agony of it is incessant — no human 
foot has scaled it — none have dared the exploit — 
and the poor Indian, with his clouded brain 
growing darker and stormier with the belief, 
tells you that the Great Fiend dwells there, and 
that they are lost who venture to ascend. The 
dense primeval forest, the- ravines and chasms, 
the vast fields of lava, the perpendicular bare 
smooth rock, springing up several feet from 
them to the lips of the surging crater, — all which 
are clearly visible from below, — these are what 
to this day have rendered it fearful and inscru- 
table. 

Three weeks after our ride to the valley of 
Turrialba, I had crossed the Cordilleras, and, 
having descended the road to La Muelle, and 
thence floated down the Serapiqui and San 
Juan in a hungo to Grey town, I was on board 
the Jamestoivn, U. S. sloop-of-war, the guest of 



APPENDIX. 347 

her genial and accomplished Captain. Don 
Eamon had returned to Panama by the route 
we had come. 

Looking back towards the mountains, among 
which we had spent these pleasant Holidays, I 
saw the volcano of the White Tower, high in 
the heavens, burning in the gray light of the 
dawn, in another world it seemed to me, so re- 
mote and isolated was it. That it was unknown 
as though it belonged in reality to another 
world, millions of miles away, and that they, 
who lived nearest to it, were those who most 
feared to tempt the solitude which invests it, 
and that it stands there, to this hour, in its un- 
violated grandeur, exciting, while it repels, the 
curiosity and hardihood of those who would add 
it as another trophy to the conquests of Sci- 
ence and the audacity of the Age, I could not 
help feeling sad and abashed to think. But, 
when my thoughts reverted to the country of 
which the Flag above me was the glowing type, 
and when the exploits of her explorers at the 
same time recurred to me, and her pioneers and 
fleets crowded upon my vision, the conviction 
arose within me, that the day will come when 
the gold of the Estrella shall return to light, 



348 APPENDIX. 

and the secrets of the valley of the Frio shall 
be made known, and Turrialba shall be scaled. 
In that pillar of smoke by day — in that pillar of 
flame by night — I read the sublime promise of 
confirmed liberty to the land, wealth, and power, 
instead of comparative insignificance and hum- 
ble fortunes, the wilderness a garden, and for 
mankind, going up there from the ends of the 
earth to the high places thereof, a purer happi- 
ness, a statelier altitude, and a brighter aspect. 

Inwardly to behold this vision, and boldly to 
disclose it, no gift of prophecy, no hazardous 
philosophy, deducing its predictions from the 
laws of science or the analysis of human prog- 
ress, not even that spirit of poetry, which some- 
times gives to the illiterate the wisdom of the 
philosopher and to the profane the infallibility 
of the prophet, is wanting. From the great 
Book of Nature, which is open to all, which all 
can read, and from which the humblest mind 
seldom fails to derive lessons of high hopeful- 
ness and expansive forethought, for the land of 
the vanished Aztec I predict an unexampled 
renovation. 

A permanent barrier to the encroachments of 
the two great seas, and gradually rising from 



APPENDIX. 349 

their level in a series of ample terraces, each 
exhibiting its peculiar forms of animal and vege- 
table life, each its peculiar soil and climate, 
each its adaptability for some special physical 
condition, thus, step by step, developing the 
whole phenomena of creation, until, as in Costa 
Rica, at a height varying from three to four 
and six thousand feet, it rolls off into extensive 
'plateaus or table- lands, divided by parallel and 
intersecting chains of mountains, crowned with 
fortresses like that of Turrialba, and pouring 
down, on their errands of health and fruitfulr 
ness, waters that never fail. Central America 
presents, in the language of Senor Astaburuaga, 
to the lover of nature, to the man of science, to 
the agriculturist, to those who prefer the pas- 
toral cares, to those who covet the precious 
metals, to the merchant, the most ambitious 
and insatiable, as, indeed, to the industrious 
and adventurous of every denomination, a field 
of incomparable novelty and exhaustless wealth. 
In a word, the forests, the rivers, the mines, the 
valleys with which it abounds — all teeming and 
overflowing with the treasures of nature — con- 
stitute it in itself a New World, which, in the 
partial obscurity that encompasses it, seems to 



350 



APPENDIX. 



have been reserved, by a Providence of infinite 
views, for future generations, and for an exhibi- 
tion of happiness and glory which shall trans- 
cend the fortunes and achievements of this day, 
justly prized and applauded as they are. 




MEAGHER'S LAST HOURS. 

[The following is an authentic account of the 
closing hours of General Meagher's life, and the 
manner of his death, kindly furnished by Mr. 
John T. Doran, of St. Louis, who at the time of 
the unfortunate occurrence was pilot of the 
steamer G. A. Thompson, lying at Fort Benton, 
which the author acknowledges with thanks :] 



" St. Louis, Dec. 16, 1869. 
" Captain W. F. Lyons : 

" Dear Sir — A very severe illness has com- 
pelled me to defer an answer to your letter, but 
realizing the importance of your request, I reply 
at my earliest convenience, though my health 
compels me to call the pen of a friend to my as- 
sistance. I will endeavor to communicate with- 
out elaboration the circumstances of General 
Meagher's death, believing that I am conver- 
sant with all the facts, as I was with him con- 



352 APPENDIX. 

stantly on the day of the sad occurre-nce, and 
was the hist man that spoke to him on earth. 

" In the spring of 1866 I was pilot on the 
s^;eamer Ontario, bound for Fort Benton. 
Among the passengers was Mrs. Gen. Meagher, 
on her way to join her husband in the mountain 
country. My position on the boat placed in 
my power many opportunities of extending 
trifling courtesies to her ; and knowing the high 
esteem in which her husband was held by the 
country, and being acquainted with his previous 
history, I endeavored, as far as lay in my power, 
to obviate the weariness of the long and tedious 
voyage. General Meagher attached undue im- 
portance to this, and ever after, though it would 
be presumption for me to say that we were 
friends, yet I had much reason to believe that 
he ever entertained the kindliest feeling towards 
me. So much by way of preface, which is not 
altogether unnecessary, as it partially explains 
the subsequent events. 

" The following year I became pilot of the 
steamer G. A. Thompson, which left St. Louis 
in the early part of April, and arrived at Fort 
Benton June 29th, 1867. On our arrival in port 
we found there the steamers Guidon and Amelia 
Poe, about one hundred yards apart from each 



APPENDIX. 353 

other, and we ancliored between the two, about 
equal distance from each. Shortly after land- 
ing I went up to the upper boat (Amelia Poe), 
and while fishing from her lower deck I saw a 
troop of about twelve horsemen riding into 
town. I afterwards discovered that they were 
General Meagher and staff. Wearying soon of 
the piscatorial sport, I went to the provision 
store of J. G. Baker, and in a back room of the 
establishment I discovered General Meagher 
reading a paper. Looking up and immediately 
recognizing me, he greeted me most warmly, 
and both seating ourselves, we engaged in a long 
conversation. 

" He informed me that on his road into Ben- 
ton he was very sick, at Sun Biver, for six days 
— that the object of his present visit was to 
procure arms and equipments for a regiment he 
had already raised to fight against the Indians ; 
and learning that the required articles were not 
there but at Camp Cook, 120 miles below, he ex- 
pressed his determination to proceed to the 
aforesaid place the next da}^ He also spoke in 
the most tender and affectionate terms of his 
wife, residing at Helena, saying that in their 
mountain home they were ' as happy as two 
thrushes in a bush.' Finally, dinner-time com- 



354 APPENDIX. 

ing on, and learning that lie was stopping at 
no particular place, I invited him down to the 
boat to dine, — an invitation which he accepted. 
After dinner we walked through the town, and 
meeting numerous friends, we were invited on 
several occasions to partake of the hospitalities 
always urgently extended to strangers in this 
section of the country ; and on each instance the 
General politely but firmly refused to accede to 
their request, saying that his experience at Sun 
River had given him a distaste for such amuse- 
ment. Thus, in walking and talking, we spent 
the afternoon, and towards evening wended our 
way to the boat (Thompson) to take tea. The 
sun had just begun to go down as we took our 
chairs out on the guards of the boat, and as the 
weather was very pleasant, we lit our cigars and 
commenced reading. I lent the General a book 
I had brought from the States ; it was the ' Col- 
legians,' by Gerald Griffin. He seemed to pe- 
ruse it with great attention for about half an 
hour, when, suddenly closing it, he turned to me 
and said very excitedly, ' Johnny, they threaten 
my life in that town ! As I passed I heard 
some men say, " There he goes." ' I endeavored 
to persuade him that his fears were utterly 
groundless, as indeed they were, for there was 



APPENDIX. 355 

not one man in the Territory who did not love 
him. Heathen asked me if I was armed, and 
on my assuring him that I was, he desired to 
see my pistols. I immediately produced two 
navy revolvers (every one is armed in that coun- 
try) ; and he seeing that they were loaded and 
capped, handed them back to me."^ Perceiving 
that he was wearied and nervous, I persuaded 
him to retire to his berth. By this time it was 
pitch-dark, the hour being about half-past nine. 
He begged me not to leave him ; but on my as- 
suring him that it would be only for a few mo- 
ments, and I would return and occupy the upper 
berth, he retired. I fixed the clothes about 
him, locked the door of the state-room, and 
went down on the lower deck. Now the lock 
on the door leading into the cabin was very de- 
fective, but I did not mind it much as I intended 
to return without delay. I had been on the 
lower deck but a short time when I heard a 
splash in the dark waters below, immediately 
followed by the cry of ' man overboard.' I 
rushed towards the water, and the engineer sa- 
luted me with, ' Johnny, it's your friend.' To 



* During his conflict with the politicians Meagher had 
been frequently threatened. 



356 APPENDIX. 

have jumped in would not only have been use- 
less but almost certain deatli, as the river there 
was about twelve feet deep, and with a current 
rushing at the rate of nine miles an hour ; and 
furthermore, it was so dark that no object could 
be discerned. Accompanied by several others 
I ran down on the shore towards the Guidon, 
which lay fifty yards below ; in the mean time 
hearing two agonizing cries from the man, the 
first one very short, the last prolonged, and of 
the most heart-rending description. We rushed 
into the wheel of the steamer and lowered our- 
selves hip-deep in the water, clinging with our 
hands to the wheel, while others threw out 
ropes and boards, but all of no avail. The next 
day cannons were fired, the river dragged, and 
the shores and islands searched, but all to no 
purpose. 

" The river below is dotted with innumerable 
small islands, of different and various areas, the 
activity of hostile Indians j^reventing us from 
exploring the ones farthest down ; and no doubt 
the body of the gallant but unfortunate Gen- 
eral was washed ashore on one of them, for 
though I wrote descriptive letters to all the 
forts below, I never heard any tidings of it. 

" These, Captain, are the particulars of Gen. 



APPENDIX. 



367 



Meagher's death, of which I know more proba- 
bly than any one else. Hoping that they may 
be of some little service to you, 

" I am, yours respectfully, 

"John T. Doran. 

" 408 N. Fourth-street, St. Louis.' 




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